ubt, as if he did not understand his meaning.

"I say if not actually younger in days and years, you look more hardy
and like whipcord than Jasper, or any of them; and there will be more
of you, thirty years hence, than of all of them put together. A good
conscience will keep one like you a mere boy all his life."

"Jasper has as clear a conscience as any youth I know, Sergeant, and is
as likely to wear on that account as any in the colony."

"Then you are my friend," squeezing the other's hand, "my tried, sworn,
and constant friend."

"Yes, we have been friends, Sergeant, near twenty years before Mabel was
born."

"True enough; before Mabel was born, we were well-tried friends; and the
hussy would never dream of refusing to marry a man who was her father's
friend before she was born."

"We don't know, Sergeant, we don't know. Like loves like. The young
prefer the young for companions, and the old the old."

"Not for wives, Pathfinder; I never knew an old man, now, who had an
objection to a young wife. Then you are respected and esteemed by every
officer in the fort, as I have said already, and it will please her
fancy to like a man that every one else likes."

"I hope I have no enemies but the Mingos," returned the guide, stroking
down his hair meekly and speaking thoughtfully. "I've tried to do right,
and that ought to make friends, though it sometimes fails."

"And you may be said to keep the best company; for even old Duncan of
Lundie is glad to see you, and you pass hours in his society. Of all the
guides, he confides most in you."

"Ay, even greater than he is have marched by my side for days, and have
conversed with me as if I were their brother; but, Sergeant, I have
never been puffed up by their company, for I know that the woods often
bring men to a level who would not be so in the settlements."

"And you are known to be the greatest rifle shot that ever pulled
trigger in all this region."

"If Mabel could fancy a man for that, I might have no great reason to
despair; and yet, Sergeant, I sometimes think that it is all as much
owing to Killdeer as to any skill of my own. It is sartainly a wonderful
piece, and might do as much in the hands of another."

"That is your own humble opinion of yourself, Pathfinder; but we have
seen too many fail with the same weapon, and you succeed too often with
the rifles of other men, to allow me to agree with you. We will get up
a shooting match in a day or two,