Copyright, 1895, by Harper & Brothers. All Rights Reserved.

FOR KING OR COUNTRY.

A Story of the Revolution.

BY JAMES BARNES.

CHAPTER I.

AT STANHAM MILLS.

It was the first day of June. The air was balmy with sweet odors, the sky was clear and blue, and everything that could sing or make a noise was endeavoring to rejoice. And this was his Britannic Majesty's colony of New Jersey in the year of grace 1772.

Out of a little valley that separated two lines of thickly wooded hills, whose sides still gleamed with the fast departing blossoms, ran a leaping brook. It swirled about the smooth brown stones at the head of a waterfall, and rushed down into the deep clear pools at the bottom. Then it did the same thing over and over again, until it slid into the meadow and beneath a great rough bridge, where it spread out into a goodly sized pond, on whose farther shore rose the timbers of a well-built dam. A water-gate and a sluiceway were at one end, and above the trees, a short distance off to the left, across the meadow, in which some sheep were feeding, rose a big stone chimney. Out of this chimney the smoke was pouring and drifting slowly upwards in the still, sunny air.

Now and then a grinding, rumbling noise echoed through the hills to the southward, which, sad to relate, unlike those to the north, were swept almost bare of trees, and were dotted with the huts of charcoal-burners. But the underbrush was doing its best to cover these bare spots with young green leaves, and the charcoal ovens were still and cold.

Up the brook, just at the verge of the meadow, was the last one of the deep clear pools, and mingling with the waterfall was the sound of children's voices. They seemed to be talking all at once, for they could be heard plainly from the old gray bridge. The bank of the last pool shelved gently on one side, and on the other ran down into a little cliff, at the bottom of which the brook scarcely moved, so deep was the water above the pebbly bottom.

Half-way up the shelving right-hand bank sat a little girl of eleven. She was making long garlands of oak leaves, pinning them carefully together with the stems. Her dress was white and trimmed with tattered lace. She looked as though she had run away from some birthday party, for no mother (or aunt, for that matter) would allow any little girl to go out into the woods in such thin slippers. One of her stockings had fallen down, and was tucked in the ribbons that crossed her ankles, and held the small slippers from coming off entirely. She had no hat on her curly head, and her bare arms were sunburned and brown.

Seated at her feet was a boy of thirteen years or there-abouts. He was hugging his knees and digging his heels at the same time into the soft earth. He also looked as if he had escaped from a party, like the little girl, for his short breeches were of sky-blue silk, with great knee-buckles, and his hair was done up like a little wig and tied with a big black ribbon. There was a rip in the sleeve of his blue velvet coat, and the lace about his neck had become twisted and was hanging over one shoulder.

"I wonder what Uncle Daniel will