explanation of the manner in which he had come to be a waif on the North Sea, in an open boat, half full of water. He had told the captain that he was not wrecked, and had not been blown off from the coast. He would make no answer of any kind to any direct question relating to the subject.

“Well, Ole, as you will not tell me how you came in the situation in which we found you, I do not see that I can do anything for you,” continued Mr. Lowington. “The ship is bound to Christiansand, and when we arrive we must leave you there.”

“Don’t leave me in Christiansand, sir. I don’t want to be left there.”

“Why not?”

Ole was silent again. Both the principal and the surgeon pitied him, for he appeared to be a friendless orphan; certainly he had no friends to whom he wished to go, and was only anxious to remain in the ship, and go to America in her.

“You may go into the steerage now, Ole,” said the principal, despairing of any further solution of the mystery.

“Thank you, sir,” replied Ole, bowing low, and backing out of the cabin as a courtier retires from the presence of a sovereign.

“What do you make of him, doctor?” added Mr. Lowington, as the door closed upon the waif.

“I don’t make anything of him,” replied Dr. Winstock. “The young rascal evidently don’t intend that we should make anything of him. He’s a young Norwegian, about fifteen years old, with neither father nor mother; for I think we may believe what he has said. If he had no regard to the truth, it was just as easy for him to lie as it was to keep silent, and it would have been more plausible.”

“I am inclined to believe that he is a runaway, either from the shore or from some vessel,” said the principal. “He certainly cannot have been well treated, for his filthy rags scarcely cover his body; and he says that the supper he had to-night was the best he ever ate in his life. It was only coffee, cold ham, and bread and butter; so he cannot have been a high liver. He seems to be honest, and I pity him.”

“But he is too filthy to remain on board a single hour. I will attend to his sanitary condition at once,” laughed the doctor. “He will breed a leprosy among the boys, if he is not taken care of.”

“Let the purser give you a suit of clothes for him, for we can’t do less than this for him.”

The doctor left the cabin, and Ole was taken to the bath-room by one of the stewards, and compelled to scrub himself with a brush and soap, till he was made into a new creature. He was inclined to rebel at first, for he had his national and inborn prejudice against soap and water in combination; but the sight of the suit of new clothes overcame his constitutional scruples. The steward was faithful to his mission, and Ole left dirt enough in the bath-tub to plant half a dozen hills of potatoes. He looked like a new being, even before he had donned the new clothes. His light hair, cut square across his forehead, was three shades lighter when it had been scrubbed, and deprived of the black earth, grease, and tar, with which it had been matted.

The steward was interested in his work, for it is a pleasure to any decent person to transform such a leper of filth into a clean and wholesome individual. Ole put on the heavy flannel shirt and the blue frock which were handed to him, and smiled with pleasure as he observed the effect. He was fitted to a pair of seaman’s blue trousers, and provided with socks and shoes. Then he actually danced with delight, and evidently regarded himself as a finished dandy; for never before had he been clothed in a suit half so good. It was the regular uniform of the crew of the ship.

“Hold on a moment, my lad,” said Muggs, the steward, as he produced a pair of barber’s shears. “Your barber did not do justice to your figure-head, the last time he cut your hair.”

“I cut it myself,” replied Ole.

“I should think you did, and with a bush scythe.”

“I only hacked off a little, to keep it out of my eyes. Captain Olaf always used to cut it.”

“Who’s Captain Olaf?” asked Muggs.

Ole was silent, but permitted the steward to remove at will the long, snarly white locks, which covered his head. The operator had been a barber once, and received extra pay for his services on board the ship in this capacity. He did his work in an artistic manner, parting and combing the waif’s hair as though he were dressing him for a fashionable party. He put a sailor’s knot in the black handkerchief under the boy’s collar, and then placed the blue cap on his head, a little on one side, so that he looked as jaunty as a dandy man-of-war’s-man.

“Now put on this jacket, my lad, and you will be all right,” continued the steward, as he gazed with pride and pleasure upon the work of his hands.

“More clothes!” exclaimed Ole. “I shall be baked. I sweat now with what I have on.”

“It’s hot in here; you will be cool enough when you go on deck. Here’s a pea-jacket for you, besides the other.”

“But that’s for winter. I never had so much clothes on before in my life.”

“You needn’t put the pea-jacket on, if you don’t want it. Now you look like a decent man, and you can go on deck and show yourself.”

“Thank you, sir.”

“But you must wash yourself clean every morning.”

“Do it every day!” exclaimed Ole, opening his eyes with astonishment.

“Why, yes, you heathen,” laughed Muggs. “A man isn’t fit to live who don’t keep himself clean. Why, you could have planted potatoes anywhere on your hide, before you went into that tub.”

“I haven’t been washed before since last summer,” added Ole.

“You ought to be hung for it.”

“You spend half your time washing yourselves—don’t you?”

“We spend time enough at it to keep clean. No wonder you Norwegians have the leprosy, and the flesh rots off the bones!”

“But I always go into the water every summer,” pleaded Ole.

“And don’t wash yourself at any other time?”

“I always wash myself once a year, and sometimes more, when I get a good chance.”

“Don’t you wash your face and hands every morning.”

“Every morning? No! I haven’t done such a thing since last summer.”

“Then you are not fit to live. If you stay in this ship, you must wash every day, and more than that when you do dirty work.”

“Can I stay in the ship if I do that?” asked Ole, earnestly.

“I don’t know anything about it.”

“I will wash all the time if they will only let me stay in the ship,” pleaded the waif.

“You must talk with the principal on that subject. I have nothing to do with it. Now, go on deck. Hold up your head, and walk like a man.”

Ole left the bath-room, and made his way up the forward ladder. The second part of the starboard watch were on duty, but nearly every person belonging to the ship was on deck, watching the distant light, which assured them they were on the coast of Norway. The waif stepped upon deck as lightly as a mountain sylph. The influence of his new clothes pervaded his mind, and he was inclined to be a little “swellish” in his manner.

“How are you, Norway!” shouted Sanford, one of the crew.

“How are you, America,” replied Ole, imitating the slang of the speaker.

“What have you done with your dirt?” added Rodman.

“Here is some of it,” answered Muggs, the steward, as he came up the ladder, with Ole’s rags on a dust-pan, and threw them overboard.

“If you throw all his dirt overboard here, we shall get aground, sure,” added Stockwell, as