minously low.

"They've done more than one could have expected; I hate to use the
whip, but we must get out of this before she goes in altogether," he
said.

Grierson nodded. He was fond of his horses, which were obviously
distressed, and flecked with spume and lather where the traces chafed
their wet flanks; but to be merciful would only increase their task.

The whip-cracks rang out like pistol-shots; and, splashing, snorting,
struggling, amid showers of mire, they drew the wagon out of its sticky
bed. They made another dozen yards; and then Grierson turned the
horses into one of the embayments where there was brush that would
support the wheels. Edgar sat down, breathless, upon a fallen trunk.

"People at home have two quite unfounded ideas about this country," he
said disgustedly. "The first is that money is easily picked up
here--which doesn't seem to need any remark; the second is that they
have only to send over the slackers and slouchers to reform them. In
my opinion, a few doses of this kind of thing would be enough to fill
them with a horror of work." He replaced the pipe he had taken out.
"It's a pity, Grierson, but we can't sit here and smoke."

They went on and nearly capsized the wagon in a pool, the bottom of
which was too soft to give them foothold while they held up the
vehicle, but they got through it and one or two others, and presently
came out, dripping from the waist down, on to the drier prairie. Then
Edgar turned and viewed their track.

"It won't bear much looking at; we had better unyoke," he said. "If
anybody had told me in England that I'd ever flounder through a place
like that, I'd--"

He paused, seeking for words to express himself fittingly.

"You'd have called him a liar," Grierson suggested.

"That hardly strikes me as strong enough," Edgar laughed.

They had spent two hours in the bluff when they brought the last load
through, and sitting down in a patch of scrub they took out their
lunch. After a while Edgar flung off his badly splashed hat and jacket
and lay down in the sunshine.

"The thing's done; the pity is it must be done again to-morrow," he
remarked, "In the meanwhile, we'll forget it; I'll draw a veil over my
feelings."

They had finished lunch and lighted their pipes when a buggy appeared
from behind a projecting dump of trees and soon afterward Flora Grant
pulled up her horse near by. Edgar rose and stood beside the vehicle
bareheaded, looking slend