The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1910-03-03
CHAPTER I.

NEE was "A tail. raWboned, rangy
young fellow with a face so
E "a tanned by wind and sun you
had the impression that his
skin would feel like leather if you
could affect the impertineuce to test it
by the sense of touch. His clothes fitted
him loosely and yet were graciously
devoid Of the bagginesS which char
acterizes the appearance Of extremely
young men whose frames are not fully
set and whose joints are still parading
through the last stages Of college de-
velopment
This tail young man in the panama
hat and gray hannels was TruXton
King, embryo globe trotter and search
er after the treasures of romance.
Somewhere up near Central park. in
one of the fashionable cross streets.
was the home of his father and his
fathers father before him-a home
which TruXton had not seen In TWO
years or more. 1t is worthy of pass
ing notice, and that is all, that his
father was manufacturer; more than
that, he was something of 4 power in
the financial world. His mother was
not strictly a social queen in the great
metropolis, but she was what we
might safely call one Of the first Ia
dies in waiting" which is quite good
enough for the wife of a mauufactur-
er, especially when one records that
her husband was a manufacturer Of
steel. 1t is also a matter Of no little
consequence that TruNtOn's mother
was more or less averse to the steel
business rs a heritage for her son
Be it understood here and n0w that
she intended TruXton for the diplo.
matte service.
But neither Truxton's father. who
wanted him to be a manufacturing
Croesus, nor TruXtons mother. who
expected him to become a social Solo
mon, appears to have taken the young
mans private inclinations into con
sideration.
Young Mr.. King believed in TO
nance. He grew up with an ever in.
creasing bump of imagination, con.
tiguous to which, strange to relate
there was a properly developed bump
of industry and application; hence it
is not surprising that he was willing
TO go far afield in search of the things
that seemed more or less worth while
TO young gentleman who had suf
fered the i'll fortune to be born in the
nineteenth century instead of the sew.
enteenth.
We come upon him at last-luckily
for us we were not actually following
him-after two years Of wonderful but
rather disillusioning adventure in mid
) Asia and all Africa He had seen the
he .ongo and the Euphrates. the Ganges
nv nd the Nile, the Yangtsekiang and
-. he Yenisei; be had climbed noun
- inns in Abyssinia, in Siam. in Tibet
and Afghanistan; he had shot big
game in more than one jungle and had
been shot al by small brown men in
more than one forest, to say nothing
of the little encounters he had had in
most unoccidental towns and cities.
For twenty days he had Travelled by
caravan across the Persian uplands,
through Herat and Meshhed and Bo
khara, striking off with his guide alone
toward the sea of Aral and the east
ern shores of the Caspian, thence
through the Ural foothills to the old
Roman highway that led down into
the sweet green valleys of land be
had thought of as nothing more thar
3,O }of n Io, i-&
Somewhere out in the shimmering
east he had learned. to his honest
amazemept, that there was ouch 8