not if it takes all the men at Blue Lick
Station to escort it!"

"Those blistered redcoats at Fort Prince George are a deal too handy to
be called on by such make-bates as the herders on the Keowee River."

"Fudge! The commandant would never let a bayonet stir."

"Gad! I'd send an ambassador for an ambassador. Tit for tat," declared
Emsden. "I'd ask 'em what's gone with all our horses,--last seen in
those desolated cow-pens,--that the voice of mourning is now lifted
about!"

There was a chuckle of sheer joy, so abrupt and unexpected that it rose
with a clatter and a cackle of delight, and culminated in a yell of
pleasurable derision.

Now everybody knew that the horses bought in that wild country would,
unless restrained, return every spring to "their old grass," as it was
called,--to the places where they had formerly lived. When this annual
hegira took place in large numbers, some permanent losses were sure to
ensue. The settlers at Blue Lick had experienced this disaster, and had
accepted it as partly the result of their own lack of precaution during
the homing fancy of the horses. But since the herders manifested so
little of the suavity that graces commercial intercourse, and as some of
the horses had been seen in their cow-pens, it was a happy thought to
feather the arrow with this taunt.

"And who do you suppose will promise to carry such a message to those
desperate, misguided men, riding hither an' thither, searching this wild
and woeful wilderness for hundreds o' head o' cattle lost like needles
in a hayrick, and eat by wolves an' painters by this time?" demanded "X"
derisively.

"I promise, I promise!--and with hearty good will, too!" declared
Emsden. "And I'll tell 'em that we are coming down soon armed to the
teeth to guard our pack-train, and fight our way through any resistance
to its passage through the country on the open trading-path. And I'll
acquaint the commandant of Fort Prince George of the threats of the
herders against the Blue Lick Stationers, and warn him how he attempts
to interfere with the liberties of the king's loyal subjects in their
peaceful vocations."

Thus Emsden gayly volunteered for the mission.

The next morning old Richard Mivane, thinking of it, shook his head over
the fire,--and not only once, but shook it again, which was a great deal
of trouble for him to take. Having thus exerted his altruistic interest
to the utmost, Richard Mivane relapsed into his normal placid