ite sufficient amount of felicity.

When we add that the other hunters were, in their several ways, pretty
much in the same condition as the boys, we have said enough to justify
the remark that their circumstances were inexpressibly delightful.

Proceeding some distance up stream they finally diverged into a minor
tributary which led to waters that were swarming with water-fowl and
other game.

"This is a grand burst, Little Bill," said Archie, as he plied his
paddle vigorously, and glanced over his shoulder at the invalid behind
him.

"Prime!" answered Billie. "Isn't it?" he added, with a backward glance
at Okematan.

"Waugh!" replied the reticent savage.

"Ay, `Waugh!' that's all you'll get out of him when he's puzzled," said
Archie; "though what he means by it is more than I know. You must speak
respectable English to a Red-skin if you want to convince him. Why, if
he had understood you literally, you know--and obeyed you--he'd have had
something to do immediately with the lock of his gun."

"I have often wondered, Archie," returned his brother with a languid
smile, "what a lot you manage to say sometimes with nothing in it."

"Ha! ha!--ho! ho! what a wag you're becoming, Little Bill. But I thank
'ee for the compliment, for you know it's only philosophers that can say
an awful lot without a'most sayin' anything at all. Look at Oke there,
now, what a depth of stupidity lies behind his brown visage; what
bucketsful of ignorance swell out his black pate, but he expresses it
all in the single word `Waugh!' because he's a philosopher. If he was
like La Certe, he'd jabber away to us by the hour of things he knows
nothin' about, and tell us long stories that are nothin' less than big
lies. I'm glad you think me a philosopher, Little Bill, for it takes
all the philosophy I've got to keep me up to the scratch of goin' about
the world wi' you on my back. Why, I'm a regular Sindbad the Sailor,
only I'm saddled with a young man o' the plains instead of an old man of
the sea. D'ee understand what I'm saying, Oke?"

The chief, who understood little more than that his own name and that of
La Certe were mentioned, nodded his head gravely and allowed the corners
of his mouth to droop, which was his peculiar way of smiling--a smile
that might have been unintelligible to his friends had it not been
relieved and interpreted by a decided twinkle in his eyes.

While they were conversing, the two canoes had rounded a ro