o catch him, but he was too late, and a glance showed that
there was no deceit in the matter, for the drops of agony were standing
on the black's face, and it was quite evident that he had fainted away.

He soon came to, however, and lay gazing wonderingly about him.

"Black fellow?" he whispered anxiously, as if the effort caused him a
great deal of pain.

"All gone along," cried Rifle, eagerly; and the black closed his eyes
again, while the boys consulted as to what they had better do.

"That's soon settled," said Norman. "We can't fetch help to him, and he
can't move, so we must stop here till he gets better. Let's cut some
sticks and drive them in the ground, tie them together at the tops, and
spread a couple of blankets over them."

This was done so as to shelter their invalid from the sun, and then they
saw to their own tent and prepared for a longer stay. After this Tim
and Rifle went off to try to shoot something, and Norman stopped to
watch the black.

It was a weary hot day, and the boys were so long that Norman began to
grow anxious and full of imaginations. Suppose the lads got bushed! He
would have to strike their trail and try to find them. Suppose poor
Shanter were to die before they came back! How horrible to be alone
with the dead out there in that solitary place.

The sun rose to its full height, and then began to descend, but the
black neither moved nor spoke, and the only companionship Norman had was
that of the two horses--his own and the one which carried the pack.
These cropped the grass round about the camp, their hobble chains
rattling a little, and the peculiar snort a horse gives in blowing
insects out of the grass he eats were the principal sounds the boy
heard. It was some comfort to walk to where they grazed and pat and
talk to them.

But he was soon back by Shanter's blanket-gunyah watching the shiny
black face, which looked very hard and stern now. He had tried him
again and again with tea, water, and bread, but there was no response;
and at last he had settled down to letting him rest, hoping that his
patient was asleep, and feeling that he could do nothing but leave him
to nature.

But it was a sad vigil, and not made more pleasant by the sight of the
great kangaroo lying just at the edge of the water-hole, and toward
which a perfect stream of insects were already hurrying over the dry
ground, while flies buzzed incessantly about it in the air. Then, too,
again and