youth. They had scattered themselves about in easy
positions. One was playing an accordion, and another a fiddle. The
officers did not interrupt them.

As Dick looked over the side at the yellow torrent some one said beside
him:

"This is a whopping big river. You don't see them as deep as this where
I come from."

Dick glanced at the speaker, and saw a lad of about his own age, of
medium height, but powerfully built, with shoulders uncommonly thick.
His face was tanned brown, but his eyes were blue and his natural
complexion was fair. He was clad completely in deerskin, mocassins
on his feet and a raccoon skin cap on his head. Dick had noticed the
Nebraska hunters in such garb, but he was surprised to see this boy
dressed in similar fashion among the Kentuckians.

The youth smiled when he saw Dick's glance of surprise.

"I know I look odd among you," he said, "and you take me for one of the
Nebraska hunters. So I am, but I'm a Kentuckian, too, and I've a right
to a place with you fellows. My name is Frank Pennington. I was born
about forty miles north of Pendleton, but when I was six months old my
parents went out on the plains, where I've hunted buffalo, and where
I've fought Indians, too. But I'm a Kentuckian by right of birth just as
you are, and I asked to be assigned to the regiment raised in the region
from which we came."

"And mighty welcome you are, too," said Dick, offering his hand. "You
belong with us, and we'll stick together on this campaign."

The two youths, one officer and one private, became fast friends in
a moment. Events move swiftly in war. Both now felt the great engines
throbbing faster beneath them, and the flotilla, well into the mouth of
the Ohio, was leaving the Mississippi behind them. But the Ohio here
for a distance is apparently the mightier stream, and they gazed with
interest and a certain awe at the vast yellow sheet enclosed by shores,
somber in the gray garb of winter. It was the beginning of February, and
cold winds swept down from the Illinois prairies. Cairo had been left
behind and there was no sign of human habitation. Some wild fowl,
careless of winter, flew over the stream, dipped toward the water, and
then flew away again.

As far as the eye was concerned the wilderness circled about them and
enclosed them. The air was cold and flakes of snow dropped upon the
decks and the river, but were gone in an instant. The skies were an
unbroken sheet of gray. The scene so lo