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 entered the jolly lad, flushed and breathless and a trifle unkempt, as was his habit, but with such a manly bearing and such a world of good-fellowship beaming from his freckled face, that the new Uncle Joe instantly rejoiced in the prospect of such a comrade for his own small lads.

"Good afternoon, Mr. Smith and—Mr. Smith; and is it all just as she says?" demanded the small gentleman from Virginia. "Has the little 'Express Parcel' really found her right uncle at last? 'Cause it's just like a 'Rabian Night's story, seems to me, and girls—well, girls, you know, they—they're sometimes silly, 'cept Josephine, maybe." Then, as if a sudden fear attacked him he turned upon her, firmly admonishing her to remember: "If I'm to be your twin, as you say, you've got to have no nonsense in it. If I say 'go in' when there's a lot of boys out in the square you'll have to mind, 'cause they don't always act polite, you see. Oh, bother! It's all boys, anyway, isn't it! I wish there was another girl, to even up"—