“Might as well be killed for a sheep as a goat,” replied the mariner.  “They’re spoiled anyhow, by this glue.  Better try to pull loose.  Go on.  I’ll hold your chair down.”

Thus advised, the minister sat down.  The crowd watched with anxiety, not unmixed with mirth.  Even the clergyman himself could not help smiling, though it was quite an embarrassing position for a dignified gentleman.

“Would you mind putting your feet on the rounds on the other side?” asked the captain of Mr. Henderson.  “Between us both I guess we can hold him down.”

The two men bore heavily on the chair-rounds, and Mr. Blackton strained to rise.  There was a pulling, ripping sound, and he hesitated.  Then, feeling that he must get loose no matter what happened, he gave a mighty tug and was free.  But his trousers, though only slightly torn, were covered with glue.

Now that it was over, and the excitement was beginning to cool down, the minister began to feel a little natural anger at the perpetrator of the “Joke.”  His best trousers were spoiled, and the donation supper had been thrown into confusion.

“Who did it?” was the question asked on every side.

The boys came slowly down from the gallery and mingled unnoticed with the throng.  Bob was a little worried.  He had not meant to humiliate the minister, but had counted on Captain Spark getting stuck to the chair.  The captain, he knew, would make light of the prank.  But it was no small matter to have done this thing to the clergyman.

“Going to supper?” asked Ted of Bob.

“No.  I don’t feel like eating.  Guess I’ll go home.”

But Bob’s plan was frustrated.  His mother, who had been looking for her son, caught sight of him.

“Oh, Bob!” she exclaimed.  “I hope none of the boys that you go with played that horrid trick on the minister!  It was a very mean thing to do!  But you had better have your supper.  The table will soon be ready again.”

Bob did not have much appetite.  He was afraid of being discovered.

The chair, with the glue on it, had been taken to the cellar, and the minister had gone home to change his trousers.  Captain Spark, who had begun to turn certain things over in his mind, approached Bob.  He had a sharp eye, had the mariner, and, in looking closely at his relative’s son, he saw a bit of evidence that Bob had not counted on.  This was nothing more nor less than a big spot of glue on the lad’s coat sleeve.

“What’s this?” asked the seaman, pointing to the sticky place.

“I don’t know.  Glue—­I guess,” replied Bob, turning pale.

“Glue, eh?  Seems to be about as sticky as that on the minister’s chair.”

At the mention of glue several persons about Bob and the captain looked curiously at them.  Mrs. Henderson, who was just then passing, carrying a big platter of baked beans, stopped to listen to what the seaman was saying.