woods, he communed with
himself after this fashion,--

"Cyrus says that different tribes of Indians wear differently made
moccasins, and one redskin, if he sees the tracks of another in soft
mud or snow, can tell what tribe he belongs to by his footmarks. That's
funny! I suppose if any old brave was knocking about and saw my tracks
in a boggy spot, he'd think it was a Kickapoo who had passed that
way--not Dol Farrar of Manchester, England. These are of the shape worn
by the Kickapoo tribe--so Cy says.

"I'm the kid of the camp, I know," he went on, with another flash in his
eyes, as if there was a bit of flint somewhere in his make-up which had
struck their steel. "But I'll be bound I can do as well or better than
the others can. I'm off now to Squaw Pond. I think I can follow the
trail easily enough. Uncle Eb showed me yesterday where he had spotted
some of the trees all the way along to the water. And if I don't shoot a
couple of black ducks for dinner or supper, I'm a duffer, and not fit
for camping."

He took down the powder-horn and slung it round him, saw that there was
plenty of meat in the ragged coon-skin ammunition pouch which hung
beside it, fastened that to his belt, slipped on his coat, and started
off, with the "ole fuzzee" on his shoulder.

Never a sound did he make as he crossed the clearing, passing the clump
of bushes behind which Cyrus and Neal had lingered on the previous night
to hear Uncle Eb's song. Owing to his Indian footwear, silently as the
gliding redskin himself he entered the woods at a point where he saw a
tree with a fresh notch carved in it. He knew this marked the beginning
of the "blazed trail," and that he must be very wide-awake and show
considerable "gumption" if he wanted to follow that line to the pond.

Not every tree was spotted. Only at intervals of fifteen or twenty yards
he came upon a trunk with two small pieces chopped out of it on opposite
sides. These were Uncle Eb's way-marks. One set of notches would catch
his eye as he went towards the water, the other would lead him back to
camp. Once or twice Dol got away from the trail, but he quickly found it
again; and in due time emerged from the forest twilight into the broad
glare of the sun, to see Squaw Pond lying before him like a miniature
mother-of-pearl sea, so protected by its evergreen woods that scarcely a
ripple stirred it.

He heard the shrill, wild call of a loon, the noisy bird to which Cyrus
had likened hi