nd Blake, try to get back with some of the
grub. There's that old bag with a little flour in it--you might find
that. And then the milk powder and the lard farther down. Maybe
Wallace could go with you as far as the flour and bring back a little
of it here. What do you say, b'y?"

"I say it's well," I answered. "We've got to do something at once."

"It's the only thing to do," said George. "I'm willin', and I'll do
the best I can to find Blake and get help."

"Then," said Hubbard, "you'd better start in the morning, boys. If you
don't find the bag, you'd better go on with George, Wallace; for then
there would be no use of your trying to get back here. Yes, boys,
you'd better start in the morning. I'll be quite comfortable here
alone until help comes."

"I'll come back, flour or no flour," I said, dreading the thought of
his staying there alone in the wilderness.

We planned it all before Hubbard went to sleep. George and I, when we
started in the morning, were to carry as little as possible. I thought
I should be able to reach the flour bag and be back within three days.
We were to prepare for Hubbard a supply of wood, and leave him
everything on hand that might be called food--the bones and the
remainder of the hide, a sack with some lumps of flour sticking to it
that I had recovered at this camp, and the rest of the yeast cakes.
George and I were to depend solely on the chance of finding game.

"I'm much relieved now," said Hubbard, when it had all been settled.
"I feel happy and contented. I feel that our troubles are about ended.
I am very, very happy and contented."

He lay down in his blanket. After a little he said: "B'y, I'm rather
chilly; won't you make the fire a little bigger."

I threw on more wood, and when I sat down I told him I should keep the
fire going all night; for the air was damp and chill.

"Oh, thank you, b'y," he murmured, "thank you. You're so good." After
another silence, the words came faintly: "B'y, won't you read to me
those two chapters we've had before?--the fourteenth of John and the
thirteenth of First Corinthians... I'd like to hear them again, b'y...
I'm very... sleepy... but I want to hear you read before... I go... to
sleep."

Leaning over so that the light of the fire might shine on the Book, I
turned to the fourteenth of John and began: "'Let not your heart be
troubled'" I paused to glance at Hubbard. He was asleep. Like a weary
child, he had fallen aslee