ll come near for some little time now. I daresay they are puzzling
themselves, first, why we are coming this way, and secondly, why we are
keeping so close."

"There is the place where we had tent," Luka exclaimed suddenly. "Do you
see the ashes of the fire?"

"That is it, sure enough. Now, run ashore and dash up the bank."

As soon as the canoe touched the shore they leapt out and ran up the
bank. Not twenty yards away were the Samoyedes. Godfrey uttered a shout
and raised his gun to his shoulder, and the natives with a yell ran off
at full speed.

"Now, Luka, do you go and get the canoe in the water. Be careful; if you
find it heavy for you with the stores on board, take them out; there is
no occasion for hurry. Those fellows won't venture within range of my
gun again; they will keep at a distance, and send up word to the tents
that we have landed. So take your time over it; if you were to make a
slip and damage the canoe it would be fatal to us."

The natives stopped at a distance of a quarter of a mile, and then, as
Godfrey expected, one of them started at a run back towards the village.
In ten minutes Godfrey heard a shout from below, and looking round saw
the canoe safely by the side of the boat. He ran down and took his place
in her, and they paddled out towing the boat behind them.

CHAPTER XVII.

A SEA FIGHT

As soon as they had reached a distance of two or three hundred yards
from the shore Godfrey ceased paddling. "Now we can talk matters over,
Luka. There is no occasion for hurry now. If these fellows in the canoes
are disposed to fight we can't prevent them. They will certainly be out
of the river before we could get back there; and even if we did pass
first they could easily overtake us, for those light craft of theirs
would go two feet to our one unless we had wind for our sail. So we may
as well take things easy, and decidedly the first thing to do is to wash
and dress Jack's wound, and then to get some tea and something to eat.
We have had nothing since we were caught yesterday between twelve and
one o'clock.

"What a lucky thing it was we hid the canoe, Luka!" he went on, as the
Tartar pulled the boat up alongside the canoe and began to prepare to
light a fire. "The chances are we should not have been able to get her
off as well as the boat, and even if we had they would have taken out
all our stores. The meat we might replace, but the loss of the tea and
tobacco, and above all of th