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204 to the home folks with a clean bill of ladin'."

The spectators sniffed incredulously, but with unexpected tact hid any livelier display of doubt.

"Why don't you mail the goods home with a letter, and send a good jolly?" said Jenkins. "We'll get 'em off for you. There's a mail wagon goin' to Tientsin early to-morrow mornin'. Tell the old lady you're fat an' sassy. She'll call in the whole village to show 'em the presents from her brave soldier boy out among them poor, benighted, gentle, murderous Chinese heathen."

Saunders rallied for the afternoon, scrawled a letter, and sent his gifts. Then he buried his head in the blankets and wept, the effort having stirred new depths of hopeless homesickness. Through the following week he failed to gain in strength and spirits, and the surgeon mentioned "nostalgia" once or twice in chatting with the nurse.

"He may lie there and flutter out, with no disease worth a diagnosis," said the "medico." "The poor idiot thinks he