than we thought when we decided to bring it along with us."

"Yes," replied Rand, "and we seem to be coming out of the little end of
it."

"Faith," exclaimed Gerald, "it looks as if that Indian was going to hold
on to our relic, and the others seem as if they were going to stand by
him."

"They certainly have seen something like it before," commented Dick, "and
maybe it's worth more to them than to us. It was only a mere guess of
ours, after Colonel Snow undertook to interpret it to us, that there might
be anything behind it, and it was only because it had evidently come from
an Arctic country that we even thought of bringing it along with us."

"I think," said Rand, "that we shall have trouble getting it back, and I,
for one, propose that we leave the whole matter in the hands of Swiftwater
and try and get the true inwardness of the thing from him. It ought to be
a good story if we don't get anything else out of it." This view was
readily agreed to, and the afternoon's work was progressing satisfactorily
when Don, after deep thought, said:

"I've been listening to this Siwash language, and I haed me doots as to
whether it was a real language like Gaelic or English or just a rumble,
but when I heard that head man scream like a white man I concluded that
it's got some elements of a language."

The conference between the miner and the chief lasted for a half hour,
after which the latter returned to his work, and Swiftwater joined the
boys. His face was still grave, and simply remarking that he would
enlighten them at supper when the afternoon's work was completed.

"I'm a little bothered about this matter," said Swiftwater, after the
evening meal was concluded, "and would have given a good deal if it hadn't
happened. My experience with savages the world over has taught me that
while you may rob them and make war on them and get away with it, that you
cannot interfere safely with their religions or their traditions. Not that
we have intentionally done so, but it may have an effect after all.

"The chief told me a long story, a good deal of which I couldn't quite
make out the sense of, but it seems that you boys have in some way got
hold of an ancient treasure of his tribe many hundred years old, and
considered in some way, sacred. He says there were two of these relics,
that they were handed from generation to generation and carefully guarded.
At first they were merely the record of a buried treasure, the wealth of