ut it is
only just to add that the number and nature of the absolutely new
subjects which were thus opened up to him had something to do with it.
His imperfect knowledge of her language, however, had a bamboozling
effect.

"Here is a thing which I think you will be glad to see," continued the
girl, as she extracted a small hatchet from the bundle.

"Yes indeed; that is a _very_ good thing," said the youth, handling the
implement with almost affectionate tenderness. "I had one once--and
that, too, is a fine thing," he added, as she drew a scalping-knife from
her bundle.

"You may have them both," she said; "I knew you would need them on the
journey."

Cheenbuk was too much lost in admiration of the gifts--which to him were
so splendid--that he failed to find words to express his gratitude, but,
seizing a piece of firewood and resting it on another piece, he set to
work with the hatchet, and sent the chips flying in all directions for
some time, to the amusement, and no small surprise, of his companion.
Then he laid down the axe, and, taking up the scalping-knife, began to
whittle sticks with renewed energy. Suddenly he paused and looked at
Adolay with ineffable delight.

"They are good?" she remarked with a cheerful nod.

"Good, good, very good! We have nothing nearly so good. All our things
are made of bone or stone."

"Now," returned the girl, with a blink of her lustrous eyes, and a yawn
of her pretty mouth, which Nature had not yet taught her to conceal with
her little hand, "now, I am sleepy. I will lie down."

Cheenbuk replied with a smile, and pointed to the canoe with his nose.

Adolay took the hint, crept into the nest which the gallant youth had
prepared for her, curled herself up like a hedgehog, and was sound
asleep in five minutes.

The Eskimo, meanwhile, resumed his labours with the scalping-knife, and
whittled on far into the night--whittled until he had reduced every
stick within reach of his hand to a mass of shavings--a beaming
childlike glow of satisfaction resting on his handsome face all the
while, until the embers of the fire began to sink low, and only an
occasional flicker of flame shot up to enlighten the increasing
darkness. Then he laid the two implements down and covered them
carefully with a piece of deerskin, while his countenance resumed its
wonted gravity of expression.

Drawing up his knees until his chin rested on them, and clasping his
hands round them, he sat for a