not make his appearance.

"He'll return soon," said Dick. "Let me consider, when did I see him
last? I cannot quite recollect, but I remember that he was following a
buffalo; and I had no doubt that he shot the brute, and fully expected
to see him here."

We waited, but we waited in vain. At last we applied to our Indian
friends, but they were revelling in buffalo meat, and were not disposed
to set out in search of Charley; promising, however, to go in the
morning should the young pale-face not have returned by that time.

I am afraid to say how much buffalo meat the savages consumed before
daybreak, for they sat up nearly all night eating, and had their enemies
pounced down upon them they would have made but a poor defence, I
suspect.

When morning came they excused themselves from going in search of
Charley, saying that they must bring in the buffalo meat they had
killed.

We therefore had to set off alone, not a little disgusted at their
behaviour. We bade them, however, a friendly farewell, saying that the
life of one of our party was more precious to us than all the buffalo
meat in the world. We however took with us the tongues and other
portions of the animals we had killed, so that we had abundance of
provisions which would last us until we could obtain venison or fall in
with another herd of buffalo.

Though we made diligent search, with the assistance of old Folkard and
the Indians engaged by Armitage, we failed to discover Charley's trail;
and we felt more out of spirits when we encamped that evening than we
had done during the whole of our expedition.

CHAPTER SEVEN.

Several days were spent in a vain search for Charley. Armitage and

Story said they feared that he must either have been killed by a
buffalo, and his body devoured by wolves; or that he had been carried
away by some small party of Indians who had been watching us, and had
captured him, though afraid to attack our camp.

Both Dick and I, however, could not bring ourselves to believe that he
was dead. We were glad to find that old Folkard was of our opinion. He
had known men, he said, who had wandered away from camp and been absent
several weeks before they were found or managed to make their way back
themselves. Charley had a good supply of ammunition, and being a fair
shot, would be able to procure food. We begged Armitage and Dick to
remain in the locality some time longer. This they consented to do. We
were now i