rchief. Mr. Bunting looked on with
exemplary gravity.

'Thar! I told th' ole woman that spruce beer ain't so good as usual this
brewin'.'

'Good! the vilest compound. A fir-tree steeped in a stagnant pool!'
exclaimed the irate captain, with considerable warmth of colouring.
'Bring me something, sirrah, to take away the odious taste--anything you
like.'

Mr. Bunting obeyed with alacrity. Arthur left father and son over their
pipes and glasses, and went outside to join Miss Armytage and Jay, who
had declined various overtures to enter the store, and were the cynosure
of all eyes in the 'Corner' as they walked to and fro on the stumpless
strip of ground in the place--a fair child and a pale girl. Presently
forth came the captain.

'Edith, my dear,' he said blandly, 'I may be detained here for half an
hour; I find that mine host, Mr. Bunting, has a very exact knowledge of
the locality to which we are going. I think you both might be going on
with the waggon; your brother will follow in a minute or so when his
smoke is finished, he says. Driver, you may go forward; _au revoir_,
Edith.'

He kissed the tips of his fingers to his daughter gallantly, and passed
into the bar again with a jaunty air.

'If you will allow me to accompany you,' said Arthur, seeing that she
hesitated, 'you will do me a kindness, for I have rather a large pack to
carry going home; I can rest it on the waggon; and Daisy Burn is more
than half-way to Cedar Creek.'

'Did I not tell you we would find out Arthur and Robert?' said the child
Jay, with an ecstatic clasp of her fingers upon young Wynn's. 'You said
you were afraid we should have no friends in the woods, but I knew that
God would not let us be so forsaken as that.'

And the three walked on into the long vista of the concession line.

CHAPTER XXIX.

ONE DAY IN JULY.

A summer more glorious than our settlers could have imagined, followed
on the steps of the tardy spring. What serene skies--what brilliant
sunshine--what tropical wealth of verdure! At every pore the rich earth
burst forth into fruit and flower. Two months after the grass had been
sunk deep beneath the snow, sheets of strawberries were spread in the
woods, an extemporized feast.

One might think that the cottage at Cedar Creek had also bloomed under
the fair weather; for when July--hottest of Canadian months--came, the
dingy wooden walls had assumed a dazzling white, with a roof so grey
that the shingles might