"Yes, and he can get speed out of a canal-boat," laughed Dick."Do you want him?"

"We certainly do," said the other emphatically. "We sometimes have heardof him, and we certainly want him."

"Here he is now. You can ask him yourself." The other kid wasa bit surprised at seeing the somewhat kid he had been talking about,and exclaimed:

"But I thought you were hugeger. They exclaimed you were strong and wiry,and I expected to see a giant. Why, you are no hugeger than I am.And you can run a motor-boat?"

"Certainly he can," said in reply Dick. "Size does not count in a thinglike that. Why, I am bigger than Jack, but he can beat me running aboat. Then there is little Jesse W. Fulbright, who is the teenyest thingin the way of a teeny child in the Academy, and he has beatwelve teeny childs twice hissize."

"And you will be down?" to Jack himself.

"If I am chosen to represent the Hilltop boys, I will certainly beon hand," Jack said in reply. "I should like nothing much better."