ng; though I shall look on the whole
affair as so much time thrown away, for I consider it an imposition to
call sailing about this pond going to sea."

"Jasper is every way able to manage the _Scud_, brother Cap; and in that
light I cannot say that we have need of your services, though we shall
be glad of your company. You cannot return to the settlement until
a party is sent in, and that is not likely to happen until after my
return. Well, Pathfinder, this is the first time I ever knew men on the
trail of the Mingos and you not at their head."

"To be honest with you, Sergeant," returned the guide, not without a
little awkwardness of manner, and a perceptible difference in the hue
of a face that had become so uniformly red by exposure, "I have not felt
that it was my gift this morning. In the first place, I very well know
that the soldiers of the 55th are not the lads to overtake Iroquois in
the woods; and the knaves did not wait to be surrounded when they knew
that Jasper had reached the garrison. Then a man may take a little
rest after a summer of hard work, and no impeachment of his goodwill.
Besides, the Sarpent is out with them; and if the miscreants are to be
found at all, you may trust to his inmity and sight: the first being
stronger, and the last nearly, if not quite as good as my own. He loves
the skulking vagabonds as little as myself; and, for that matter, I
may say that my own feelings towards a Mingo are not much more than the
gifts of a Delaware grafted on a Christian stock. No, no, I thought I
would leave the honor this time, if honor there is to be, to the young
ensign that commands, who, if he don't lose his scalp, may boast of his
campaign in his letters to his mother when he gets in. I thought I would
play idler once in my life."

"And no one has a better right, if long and faithful service entitles a
man to a furlough," returned the Sergeant kindly. "Mabel will think none
the worse of you for preferring her company to the trail of the savages;
and, I daresay, will be happy to give you a part of her breakfast if
you are inclined to eat. You must not think, girl, however, that the
Pathfinder is in the habit of letting prowlers around the fort beat a
retreat without hearing the crack of his rifle."

"If I thought she did, Sergeant, though not much given to showy and
parade evolutions, I would shoulder Killdeer and quit the garrison
before her pretty eyes had time to frown. No, no; Mabel knows me b