ted 'roun' a
leetle you might hev found one that would hev done ez well."

"And you Paul?" said Harry.

"I'm glad to follow where you lead."

"And you, Jim?"

"I'm uv Paul's mind."

"Then it's settled. Now, we'll have something to eat, and talk it
over."

They soon found a little valley in which a clear rivulet was flowing.
One was never more than a mile from running water in that country--and
Long Jim and Silent Tom produced food from their deerskin pouches.

"Here's some ven'son," said Jim. "It's cold an' it's tough, but I reckon
it'll do."

"I'm thinkin'," said Shif'less Sol, "that after a night like the one
Henry has had he'll be pow'ful hungry fur somethin' better than cold
ven'son."

"Mebbe so," rejoined Long Jim, "an' mebbe it's true uv all uv us, but
whar are we goin' to git it?"

"I'm an eddycated man, Jim Hart, eddycated in the ways o' the woods, an'
one o' the fust things you do when you're gittin' that sort o' an
eddication is to learn to use your eyes. I hev used mine, an' jest
before we set down here I noticed the fresh trail o' buffler runnin' off
to the right, 'bout a dozen, I'd say, an' jest ez shore ez I'm here
they're not more'n a mile away. I kin see 'em now, grazin' in a little
open, an' thar is a young cow among 'em, juicy an' tender. Now I don't
want to kill a young cow buffler, but we must hev supplies before we go
on this expedition."

"Sol is right," said Henry, "and since he is so it's his duty to go and
kill the buffalo. Tom, you'll go with him, won't you?"

"O' course," replied Silent Tom.

Shif'less Sol rose and looked to his rifle.

"I knowed I would hev to do all the work, besides supplyin' the
thinkin'," he said. "Here I tell what's to be done when the others
ain't able to think it out, an' then they tell me to go an' do it. It
ain't fair to a lazy man, one who furnishes the intelleck. The rest o'
you ought to work fur him."

"Go on you, Sol Hyde," said Long Jim Hart, rebukingly, "an' kill that
buffler. Don't you know that when you kill it I'll hev to cook it, an' I
ain't complainin'?"

"Quit braggin' on yourse'f, Jim Hart. You ain't complainin', 'cause you
ain't got sense 'nuff to complain. You're plum' sunk so deep in sloth
an' ig'rance that you're jest satisfied with anythin', no matter how bad
it is. It's men o' intelleck like me who complain and look fur better
things, who make the world go forward."

"Your idea uv goin' forward, Sol Hyde, is to do it ridin'