s of the keys and the mangrove-lined banks of the
salt-water rivers for a camping-ground. He could have made his own
camp on the overflowed meadows almost anywhere, but Dick was still
an invalid and Ned was always anxious about him. Six miles from the
camp, where he had left Dick with Tom, Ned found a good camping
site, marked by a freak palmetto with a trunk that branched into two
stems about midway up. The ground was covered with palmetto scrub,
which Ned examined carefully for rattlesnakes, after which he got
out his fly-rod and caught a mess of fish for supper. On his return
to camp the lynx sprang into the canoe, seized one of the fish and
growled so fiercely that Ned thought best to let him keep it.
[Illustration: "NED FOUND A GOOD CAMPING SITE MARKED BY A FREAK
PALMETTO"]

"Fresh water is all out, Dick," said Ned that night, "so I'll start
at daylight and go back to the river and fill up. I'll take it
slowly and be here about noon. Then we can start out and make easy
work of being in the new camp long before sun-down."

"Ned, I can paddle all right, and I'm going to help. I am sick of
being a baby."

"Go 'way, chile, you make me tired. Don't forget that I'm your
doctor," replied Ned.

"Do you see any chance of getting to the coast?"

"Yes; pretty sure thing. I found a deep channel near the camp with
some porpoises playing in it, and I think it's near the head of one
of the big coast rivers. I am almost certain it's Rodgers River."

[Illustration: "THE LYNX SPRANG INTO THE CANOE AND SEIZED ONE OF THE
FISH"]

Ned was a tired boy when the day's work was done and the young
explorers were settled in the new camp, but a night's sleep braced
him up so that he agreed to his chum's plan to make a dash for the
coast, for Dick had said:

"What is the use of losing a lot of time in prospecting for a soft
spot for me to sleep? We can be on the coast to-night within sight
of houses and help if we need it, which we don't, for I'm going to
do my share of the paddling. I know that coast and you don't, so
I'll naturally be boss."

When the little canoe had been loaded with all their stores and
trophies, and the boys were ready for their final trip, Tom stepped
gravely aboard, and seating himself in the bow, turned to Ned with
an expression which Dick translated as:

"I am here, you may start the engine."

Ned dipped his paddle deeply in the water, that with his every
stroke flowed more swiftly. The banks became wel