r beyond
himself. He was of use to somebody, and had he died, he would have
been regretted. To us this means little; to this unhappy man it meant
everything. He found, to his astonishment, that he was not despised, and
that, by the strange concurrence of circumstances, he had been brought
into a position in which his convict experiences gave him authority.
He was skilled in all the mysteries of the prison sheds. He knew how to
sustain life on as little food as possible. He could fell trees without
an axe, bake bread without an oven, build a weatherproof hut without
bricks or mortar. From the patient he became the adviser; and from the
adviser, the commander. In the semi-savage state to which these four
human beings had been brought, he found that savage accomplishments
were of most value. Might was Right, and Maurice Frere's authority of
gentility soon succumbed to Rufus Dawes's authority of knowledge.

As the time wore on, and the scanty stock of provisions decreased, he
found that his authority grew more and more powerful. Did a question
arise as to the qualities of a strange plant, it was Rufus Dawes who
could pronounce upon it. Were fish to be caught, it was Rufus Dawes
who caught them. Did Mrs. Vickers complain of the instability of her
brushwood hut, it was Rufus Dawes who worked a wicker shield, and
plastering it with clay, produced a wall that defied the keenest wind.
He made cups out of pine-knots, and plates out of bark-strips. He worked
harder than any three men. Nothing daunted him, nothing discouraged him.
When Mrs. Vickers fell sick, from anxiety and insufficient food, it was
Rufus Dawes who gathered fresh leaves for her couch, who cheered her by
hopeful words, who voluntarily gave up half his own allowance of meat
that she might grow stronger on it. The poor woman and her child called
him "Mr." Dawes.

Frere watched all this with dissatisfaction that amounted at times
to positive hatred. Yet he could say nothing, for he could not but
acknowledge that, beside Dawes, he was incapable. He even submitted
to take orders from this escaped convict--it was so evident that the
escaped convict knew better than he. Sylvia began to look upon Dawes as
a second Bates. He was, moreover, all her own. She had an interest in
him, for she had nursed and protected him. If it had not been for
her, this prodigy would not have lived. He felt for her an absorbing
affection that was almost a passion. She was his good angel, his