whisper against his hospitality would rouse him.

"Find him, Firm, find him," he said, in his deep sad voice, as he sat
down on the antlered stump and gazed at the fire gloomily. "And when
he is found, call a public postmortem, and prove that we gave him his
bellyful."

Ephraim, knowing the old man's ways, and the manners, perhaps, of the
neighborhood, beckoned to Suan to be quick with something hot, that he
might hurry out again. Then he took his dinner standing, and without a
word went forth to seek.

"Take the snow-harrow, and take Jowler," the old man shouted after him,
and the youth turned round at the gate and waved his cap to show that
he heard him. The snow was again falling heavily, and the afternoon was
waning; and the last thing we saw was the brush of the mighty tail of
the great dog Jowler.

"Oh, uncle, Firm will be lost himself!" I cried, in dismay at the great
white waste. "And the poor man, whoever he is, must be dead. Do call him
back, or let me run."

Mr. Gundry's only answer was to lead me back to the fireside, where
he made me sit down, and examined me, while Suan was frying the
butter-beans.

"Who was it spied you on the mountains, missy, the whole of the way from
the redwood-tree, although you lay senseless on the ground, and he was
hard at work with the loppings?"

"Why, Ephraim, of course, Uncle Sam; every body says that nobody else
could have noticed such a thing at such a distance."

"Very well, my dear; and who was it carried you all the way to this
house, without stopping, or even letting your head droop down, although
it was a burning hot May morn?"

"Mr. Gundry, as if you did not know a great deal better than I do! It
was weeks before I could thank him, even. But you must have seen him do
it all."

The Sawyer rubbed his chin, which was large enough for a great deal of
rubbing; and when he did that, I was always sure that an argument went
to his liking. He said nothing more for the present, but had his dinner,
and enjoyed it.

"Supposing now that he did all that," he resumed, about an hour
afterward, "is Firm the sort of boy you would look to to lose his own
self in a snow-drift? He has three men with him, and he is worth all
three, let alone the big dog Jowler, who has dug out forty feet of snow
ere now. If that rogue of an Englishman, Goad, has had the luck to cheat
the hangman, and the honor to die in a Californy snow-drift, you may
take my experience for it, missy, Firm a