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the frozen shores of the Antarctic Continent, and the na-
tives took the shark away from him and cut it open, and
beean to take out cigars and hair-brushes and hymn books
and cork screws and revolvers and other things belonging
to a missionary who had been missed from the Friendly
Islands three years before; and when he demanded a share
of the Snd the natives laughed in his face and would give
him no part of it except a sodden wad of crumpled paper.
But this paper turned out to be a lottery ticket, and with
it the Scot afterward collected a prize of 500,000 francs in
Paris. Everybody agreed that this was "remarkable and
interesting," but nobody tried to throw any doubt upon it.

The Captain told how a maniac chased him round and
round the mainmast one day with an ax, until he was
nearly exhausted, and at last the racket brought the mate
up from below who threw a steamer chair in the way, the
maniac stumbled over it and fell, then the mate jumped
on his back and got the ax away from him, and the Cap-
tain's life was saved. There was nothing unreasonable or
unlikely about this, yet the Captain told it in such an un-
plausible way that it was plain nobody believed him.

Presently the Scot told about a pet flying-fish he once
owned, that lived in a little fountain in his conservatory
and supported itself by catching birds and frogs in the
neighboring field. He was believed. He is always believed,
yet he never tells anything but lies; whereas the Captain
is never believed, although he never tells a lie, so far as I
can judge.

My own luck has been curious all my literary life; I
never could tell a lie anybody would doubt, or a truth
anyone would believe.

On the voyage from Australia Mark Twain
had read some fascinating books on ant life, by
Sir John Lubbock.

In Jeypoor I tried several of Sir John Lubbock's experi-

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