PEEP AT OUR NEIGHBORS. 129

them—‘‘ very fond, indeed.”” There
was no white lie about that statement.

‘* Because,”’ she added, as if I had not
spoken, ‘we have some very fine ones,
and father says you can have one every
day, if you will come over to our house
and get it.”

That made me blush. Would you
like to know why? J’ll tell you. Mr.
Redmond had a patch of watermelons
that year, just back of his blacksmith’s
shop, and I had been persuaded to join a
company of bad boys, one evening, and
to lend a hand in stealing—hooking, re-
garded as rather a milder word, was the
term used by the boys—some of these