ith my knife and threw them down the cliff before I saw you."

"Then ez you've cleared out the place, Henry," said Long Jim, "I guess
it's all safe, an' here goes."

He bent down from his mighty height and entered, the others following
silently in single file, swallowed up by the dusk. Then they stood in a
group, until they could see one another, the faint light from the door
helping.

"Well," said Henry, proudly, "haven't I done well by you? Isn't our new
house equal to my announcement of it?"

"Equal, and more than equal!" exclaimed Paul with enthusiasm. "Why, we
haven't had such a place since that time we lived on the island in the
lake, and this is a greater protection from danger."

"An' we hev plenty o' water, too, I see," said Shif'less Sol. "Look at
the river over thar, runnin' along ag'in the wall. 'Tain't more'n three
inches wide, an' an inch deep, but it runs fast."

"I've no doubt that a cave family lived here two or three hundred
thousand years ago," said Paul, his vivid fancy blossoming forth at
once.

"What are you talkin' about, Paul?" said Long Jim. "People livin' here
two or three hundred thousand years ago! Why, the world is only six
thousand years old! The Bible says so!"

"In the Biblical sense a year did not mean what a year does now, Jim. It
may have been a thousand times as long. Men did live in caves several
hundred thousand years ago. A book that Mr. Pennypacker has says so."

"If the book says it, I reckon it's so," said Long Jim, with the
borderer's sublime faith in the printed word.

"The man of that time was a big, hairy fellow. He didn't have even bows
and arrows. He fought with a stone club or ax of stone."

"An' do you mean to tell me, Paul, that a man with jest a club could go
out an' meet the arrers of the Injuns? Why, all uv them warriors kin
shoot arrers pow'ful hard an' straight. What chance would the man with
the club hev had?"

"There were no Indians then, Jim."

"No Injuns then!" exclaimed Long Jim indignantly. "Why the fust white
man that ever come through these parts found the woods full uv 'em. I
take a heap from you, Paul, 'cause you're an eddicated boy, but I can't
swaller this."

"I'll prove it to you some day," said Paul laughing, "but whether you
believe me or not this place suits us."

"How much venison have we got, Tom?" asked Henry.

"'Nough in a pinch to last three days."

"Now you fellers kin keep on talkin' ef you want to," said the shiftless
o