refuge for hundreds of
men who find life unpleasant in more civilized sections, and we must keep
them under supervision. By the way, I have just received notification from
the United States marshal at Ketchikan that three queer characters dropped
off the steamer from Seattle there and were heading for the Klondike, and
would probably pass through here, and he asks us to keep an eye on them.
Thus far I have seen nothing of them."

"Dublin, Rae and Monkey," exclaimed Rand.

"Oh; you know them, do you?" said Major McClintock.

"Jack here knows them very well," said Dick with a grin.

"Chance for more detective work, Jack," urged Rand.

"Faith, he might join the Mounted Police," cried Gerald. "Major, won't you
give Jack a chance with your troop?"

The boys joined in the laugh, and Jack, who had begun to enjoy the joke on
himself, told Major McClintock of their various encounters with the three
men, and all that was known of their careers.

"Well," said the officer, "we'll keep a sharp eye out for them."

The head of the Mounted Police, who seemed very familiar with the Boy
Scouts of Great Britain, told them something of the great organization in
England headed by General Baden-Powell, with whom he himself had served in
South Africa.

As they bade him good night the Major said that the jurisdiction of his
post extended over the territory to which they were going, and that some
time during their stay there one of his patrols would call on them.

At an early hour the next morning, Swiftwater and the boys went down to
the boats, aboard which the Indian crews had passed the night, and were
there joined by Skookum Joe, who was to go with them as far as the mouth
of the confluent upon which Colonel Snow's land was located, at which
point he was to join a steamer running on down the Yukon River to Dawson.

They floated out upon the swift current of the Lewes River, which many
miles further away is joined by the Pelly to make the Yukon, the Behring
Sea, some eighteen hundred miles away.

The passage down the Lewes was comparatively easy except for the rapids
through which the Indian boatmen guided the flat-bottomed craft by long
steering oars, one at each end and one at the side. Swiftwater had placed
himself and Jack, Don and Gerald in one boat, and assigned Skookum Joe and
Rand, Pepper and Dick to the other.

The run through the small canyons and the rapids was an exciting one to
the boys, who were unused to such ro