e to have it
put in the box, and leave it here till some steamer can be hired to
bring it down."

"Tho rain and dampness will spoil it."

"He told me to wrap it up in the oil-cloth that belongs with it; but,
if you are willing, Lieutenant Jackson, we will astonish him by taking
it down with us."

"I think it would astonish me as much as him to see it done."

"We can do it."

"I hear that you are an engineer, Phil," added my passenger. "Morgan
says you engineered the job of transporting the gun."

"The grand piano is not more than two or three hundred pounds heavier
than the twelve-pounder."

"That is adding a third, and the gun was on wheels."

"No matter for that; we had but three to do that, and now we have a
dozen."

"How will you do it, Phil?"

I explained my plan, and Mr. Jackson thought it was practicable.

"I suppose Mr. Gracewood and his family intend to remain at the
clearing after we have moved the house," continued my companion in the
barge.

"I don't know. I don't believe his wife and daughter will be content to
stay a great while in this lonely place. They may live here during the
summer; but in winter we don't see anybody or anything for months."

"What do you do in winter?"

"I have been studying for several years."

"I thought you talked very well for a boy brought up in the woods."

"I don't have anything to do for six months in the year but take care
of the horses, and do the housework. I read and study about twelve
hours a day in winter. I took up Latin and French last season."

"Indeed! You will make a learned man if you keep on. Have you no desire
to see more of the world?"

"Sometimes I have. I don't think I shall stay here many years longer."

"I shouldn't think you would. Why do you study Latin and French?"

"Only because I like them. It is a very great pleasure to me to puzzle
out the sentences. Mr. Gracewood is a great scholar, and has plenty of
books on the island. I believe I have read them all, except the
dictionaries. He had given me a lot of books, which he sent to St.
Louis for."

"I should think you would want to know something about your
family--your father and mother," added the lieutenant, to whom Mr.
Gracewood had related the substance of my history.

"I do, sometimes; but I am almost sure I should learn that one or both
of them were lost in the steamer."

"Perhaps not. Mr. Gracewood thinks your foster-father did very wrong in
not causing some inquiries