gle with
the rapids, the hunger and privations, the new life which had been
implanted in Scotty's heart was his greatest stay. Many a time in the
face of temptation he blessed the saintly old woman far away in the
Canadian backwoods for the godly training he had received beneath the
Silver Maple. He found he needed all his strength in this new, wild
life; for a more gaily-gallant, reckless, devil-may-care crew than the
Canadian voyageurs, who fought and overcame the ancient Nile, surely
never wielded paddles. His chief trial was his own faithful follower,
for Dan Murphy strove to out-Canadian the wildest river-driver of the
Ottawa valley. And had Scotty's strong hand not been often placed upon
the unsteady tiller of his friend's life, there might have been a
sadder wreck among the Nile voyageurs than has been set down in
history. His vigilant oversight of Dan's conduct did not prevent him
distinguishing himself in quite a unique way.

Ever since he had left Cairo that young man's one hope in life had been
to participate in a battle. There came a day, later, when he and
Scotty worked side by side on the blood-stained rocks of the desert,
helping to remove the dead and wounded; when they saw their General's
body lowered into its lonely grave, and witnessed the hundred harrowing
sights of a battlefield; and then and there, much of the boyish glamour
of battle faded before the horrible reality. But that time had not yet
come; and, like Napoleon, Dan was convinced that war was a grand game.

So when the reluctant enemy at last massed itself upon the rocky ledges
of Kirbekan to delay the column, and the joyful news spread through the
impatient army that at last they were to meet the foe, none was so
eager for the fray as Dan. In spite of Scotty's admonitions, he went
to one of his officers to beg permission to join the advance the next
morning. The request was promptly refused, and the volunteer bidden
with scant ceremony to go back to his boat and mind his own business.
But Mr. Murphy was convinced that his business lay with the front rank
of the advancing column. He had not been trained to army discipline
and was not minded to lose the glorious chance of participating in a
real battle for such a trifling consideration as one man's opinion.

So in the grey dawn of the morning, when the troops marched out over
sand and barren rock, there went with them a man who had neither the
uniform nor the dogged stride of the