ting
waters.

"Ez I think I told you before," said Shif'less Sol, "I'm a mighty good
runner. But thar are some things I kin do besides runnin'. Runnin' all
night, even when you slow up a bit, gits stale. Your mind grows mighty
tired o' it even if your feet do plant themselves one after another jest
like a machine. Now, my mind is sayin' enough, so I think, Henry, we
might git through this swamp, leavin' no trail, o' course, an' rest on
some good solid little bit o' land surrounded by a sea o' mud."

"That's right, Sol. It's what we must do, but we must cross to the other
side of the creek before we find our oasis."

"Oasis! What's an oasis?"

"It's something, surrounded by something else," Henry explained. "Come
on now, Sol. Watch your footing. Don't get yourself any muddier than
you can help."

"I'm follerin', steppin' right in your tracks, over which the soft mud
draws the minute my foot has left 'em. I'm glad thar are lots o' bushes
here, 'cause they'll hide us from any warriors who may be in advance o'
the main band."

The creek was not as deep and wide as the other, and they crossed it
without trouble. Two hundred yards further on they found a tiny island
of firm ground set thick with saplings and bushes, among which they
crawled and lay down, until regular breathing came back. Then they
scraped the mud off their moccasins and leggings and sat up on the hard
earth.

"An' so this is an oasis?" said Shif'less Sol.

"Yes, solid ground, surrounded for a long distance by mud."

"An' with saplin's an' bushes so thick that the sharpest eyed warrior
ever born couldn't see into it. Henry, I'm thinkin' that we've found
another little home."

"One that hides us from people passing by, but that does not put a roof
over our heads or give us food to eat."

"Do you care to rec'lect, Henry, that all our venison is gone?"

"Don't talk to me about it now. I know we'll be hungry soon, but we'll
just have to be hungry, and that's all."

"I wish it _wuz_ all. I'm hungry right now, an' I know that the longer
I lay here the hungrier I'll git. I'm lookin' ahead, Henry, an' I see
the time when we'll hev to shoot a deer, even ef thar are ten thousand
warriors in a close ring about us."

"Peep between those vines, Sol, and you can see them now among the
bushes on the far side of the creek."

The shiftless one raised himself up a little, and looked in the
direction that Henry had indicated. There was sufficient moonlight t