s.
Everywhere those engaged in the work were tumbling down in the water
or being carried off their feet by the current and rescued again with
difficulty, to be hauled out on the bank, exhausted, soaked to the skin
and covered with slimy mud.

For awhile this had seemed funny to the troops waiting to cross, and
they had yelled and laughed themselves hoarse at the mishaps of their
comrades. Now the fun had all evaporated and everybody was morose, with
a strong tendency to outbreaks of profanity.

The old man surveyed the scene with evident satisfaction. "Yo' Yankees
will git over thar about the middle o' July," he chuckled. "Now, I
reckon that's Goober Crick, an' as I have done seed hit you'll let me go
back home, I s'pose, won't ye?"

"That's probably Goober Crick, or at least Goober Crick is somewhere
under that muddy freshet," acquiesced Shorty. "But I'm not at all
sure that it's the crick. Looks more like a misplaced chunk out o'
the Mizzoori River. I'm not sure, either, that your eyes kin see that
distance. We'll have to walk you till we find a section of the crick
somewhere that kin be recognized by the naked eyes. Come along, and step
lively."

The old man groaned, but there was no hope for him from these relentless
executants of orders. For a half hour more they plodded on. The mud
grew deeper at every step, but the boys mercilessly forced the old man
through the worst of it, that they might reach some point where they
could actually see Goober Crick. He could not palm off on them any
common old mud freshet for a creek that had a regular place on the map.

Finally they came near the pontoons, and saw one almost capsize,
throwing everybody in it into the water, while another whirled madly
away toward the center of the current, with but one man in, who was
frantically trying to stop it and save himself.

"Yes, he'll stop it, much," said Shorty, looking after him. "If he gits
ashore before he reaches the Mississippi I'll be surprised. Say, Si,
it'll be easier lookin' for Goober Crick in a boat than wading through
the mud. Let's git in one o' them boats."

This terrified the old man till he was ready to yield.

"I begin t' know the place," he admitted. "If we take this path through
the woods t' the left hit'll bring us out whar yo' kin see Goober Crick
for sartin, an' no mistake. Hit's allers above high-water thar."

The boys followed. A very short walk through a curtain of deep woods
brought them on to muc