st let me feel your arm? Splendid
biceps! Now, boys, see here: this is what I call muscle.' And Nan
delivered a short lecture with Dan's sinewy arm to illustrate it. Tom
retired to the alcove and glowered at the stars, while he swung his own
right arm with a vigour suggestive of knocking someone down.

'Make Tom sexton; he'll enjoy burying the patients Nan kills. He's
trying to get up the glum expression proper to the business. Don't
forget him, Dan,' said Ted, directing attention to the blighted being in
the corner.

But Tom never sulked long, and came out from his brief eclipse with the
cheerful proposition:

'Look here, we'll get the city to ship out to Dansville all the cases of
yellow fever, smallpox, and cholera that arrive; then Nan will be happy
and her mistakes won't matter much with emigrants and convicts.'

'I should advise settling near Jacksonville, or some such city, that you
might enjoy the society of cultivated persons. The Plato Club is there,
and a most ardent thirst for philosophy. Everything from the East is
welcomed hospitably, and new enterprises would flourish in such kindly
soil,' observed Mr March, mildly offering a suggestion, as he sat among
the elders enjoying the lively scene.

The idea of Dan studying Plato was very funny; but no one except naughty
Ted smiled, and Dan made haste to unfold another plan seething in that
active brain of his.

'I'm not sure the farming will succeed, and have a strong leaning
towards my old friends the Montana Indians. They are a peaceful tribe,
and need help awfully; hundreds have died of starvation because they
don't get their share. The Sioux are fighters, thirty thousand strong,
so Government fears 'em, and gives 'em all they want. I call that a
damned shame!' Dan stopped short as the oath slipped out, but his eyes
flashed, and he went on quickly: 'It is just that, and I won't beg
pardon. If I'd had any money when I was there I'd have given every cent
to those poor devils, cheated out of everything, and waiting patiently,
after being driven from their own land to places where nothing will
grow. Now, honest agents could do much, and I've a feeling that I ought
to go and lend a hand. I know their lingo, and I like 'em. I've got a
few thousands, and I ain't sure I have any right to spend it on myself
and settle down to enjoy it. Hey?'

Dan looked very manly and earnest as he faced his friends, flushed and
excited by the energy of his words; and all felt