hat Alice meant when she said--

'Why not go and discover the source of the Nile?'

Of course Oswald knows quite well that the source of the real live
Egyptian Nile is no longer buried in that mysteriousness where it lurked
undisturbed for such a long time. But he was not going to say so. It is
a great thing to know when not to say things.

'Why not have it an Arctic expedition?' said Dicky; 'then we could take
an ice-axe, and live on blubber and things. Besides, it sounds cooler.'

'Vote! vote!' cried Oswald. So we did. Oswald, Alice, Noel, and Denny
voted for the river of the ibis and the crocodile. Dicky, H. O., and the
other girls for the region of perennial winter and rich blubber.

So Alice said, 'We can decide as we go. Let's start anyway.'

The question of supplies had now to be gone into. Everybody wanted to
take something different, and nobody thought the other people's things
would be the slightest use. It is sometimes thus even with grown-up
expeditions. So then Oswald, who is equal to the hardest emergency that
ever emerged yet, said--

'Let's each get what we like. The secret storehouse can be the shed in
the corner of the stableyard where we got the door for the raft. Then
the captain can decide who's to take what.'

This was done. You may think it but the work of a moment to fit out an
expedition, but this is not so, especially when you know not whether
your exploring party is speeding to Central Africa or merely to the
world of icebergs and the Polar bear.

Dicky wished to take the wood-axe, the coal hammer, a blanket, and a
mackintosh.

H. O. brought a large faggot in case we had to light fires, and a pair
of old skates he had happened to notice in the box-room, in case the
expedition turned out icy.

Noel had nicked a dozen boxes of matches, a spade, and a trowel, and had
also obtained--I know not by what means--a jar of pickled onions.

Denny had a walking-stick--we can't break him of walking with it--a book
to read in case he got tired of being a discoverer, a butterfly net and
a box with a cork in it, a tennis ball, if we happened to want to play
rounders in the pauses of exploring, two towels and an umbrella in the
event of camping or if the river got big enough to bathe in or to be
fallen into.

Alice had a comforter for Noel in case we got late, a pair of scissors
and needle and cotton, two whole candles in case of caves.

And she had thoughtfully brought the tablecloth off the s