om was the dignified manager of the great White Pine Mining
Company, calmly sitting on the prostrate bodies of four others, while
a fifth, who had just struggled to his feet with a very rueful
countenance, suddenly dropped to the deck again as he caught sight of
Connell.

Greeting Peveril with a hearty cheer, and carrying him with them, the
_Bronchos_ regained their ship and cast off the lines that held her to
the schooner. As these were loosed her jingle-bell rang merrily, her
screw churned the dimpled waters into a yeasty foam, and, with a
derisive farewell yell from her exultant crew, she dashed away,
leaving her recent antagonist enveloped in a cloud of sulphurous
smoke. The whole affair had occupied just five minutes.

There was no lack of entertainment on board the good tug _Broncho_ as
she again headed southward and ploughed her way briskly towards
Laughing Fish, for every one had thrilling stories to tell or to hear.

"It seems to me," remarked Major Arkell to Peveril, after listening
attentively to the young man's narration, "that you have managed to
compress a greater number of desperate adventures and hair-breadth
escapes into a short space of time than any other man in the Copper
Country. I, for instance, have been here for ten years, and haven't
yet had an adventure worth the telling."

"Not even the one of this morning?"

"Oh, that was only an incident compared with what has happened to you.
How do you manage it? Do you always find such stirring times wherever
you go?"

"No, indeed," laughed Peveril; "until very recently I have led a most
quiet and uneventful life. Even now I would gladly exchange all my
adventures, as you are pleased to call them, for the smallest scrap of
information regarding the mine that I came out here to find."

"Haven't you learned anything concerning your Copper Princess yet?"

"Not one word."

"That's strange! I wonder if it can be located in the Ontonagon
region?"

"I had just about made up my mind to visit that section and find out,"
replied Peveril. "That is, if I have earned enough money while working
for you to pay my travelling expenses."

"I guess you have," laughed the major; "but I can't let you go yet a
while, for I shall want you to help me settle accounts with that old
fellow who stole our logs. Besides, you have so aroused my curiosity
regarding those prehistoric workings of yours that I should like very
much to visit them. Do you think you could find t