ssed, and
the river ran wandering on through a wild and open district, where the
only inhabitants were the few shepherds who attended the flocks.

On still, and on, among the low meadows, through which the river had cut
its way in bygone times. Serpentine hardly expressed its course, for it
so often turned and doubled back over the ground it had passed before;
but still it, on the whole, flowed rapidly, and by slow degrees mile
after mile was placed between the boys and the town. Twice over a
curious sensation of drowsiness came upon Dexter, and he found himself
hard at work trying to hunt out some of his pets, which seemed to him to
have gone into the most extraordinary places.

For instance, Sam the toad had worked himself down into the very toe of
the stocking he had been obliged to take off when he went into the
water, and the more he tried to shake it out, the more tightly it clung
with its little hands.

Then he woke with a start, and found out that he had dozed off.

Pulling himself together he determined not to give way again, but to try
and guide the boat.

To properly effect this he still sat fast with the boat-hook across his
knees, and in an instant he was back at the doctor's house in Coleby,
looking on while Helen was busy reading the letter which had been
brought down from the bedroom.

Dexter could see her perfectly plainly. It seemed a thoroughly
realistic proceeding, and she was wiping her eyes as she read, while, at
the same moment, the doctor entered the room with the willow pollard
from the bottom of the garden; and lifting it up he called him an
ungrateful boy, and struck him a severe blow on the forehead which sent
him back on to the carpet.

But it was not on to the carpet, but back into the bottom of the boat,
and certainly it was a willow branch which had done the mischief, though
not in the doctor's hand.

Dexter got up again, feeling rather sore and confused, for the boat had
drifted under a projecting bough, just on a level with the boy's head,
but his cap had saved him from much harm.

Dexter's first thought was that Bob would jump up and begin to bully him
for going to sleep. But Bob was sleeping heavily, and the bump, the
fall, and the rocking of the boat only acted as a lullaby to his
pleasant dreams.

And then it seemed that a tree on the bank--a tall poplar--was very much
plainer than he had seen any tree before that night. So was another on
the other bank, and direct