ey had
met like the knights of old in the shock of mortal conflict.

"Is't yerself, Dick Varley?"

Dick held out his hand, and his eyes glistened, but he could not find
words.

Marston seized it, and pushing his horse close up, vaulted nimbly off
and alighted on Charlie's back behind his friend.

"Off ye go, Dick! I'll take ye to yer mother."

Without reply, Dick shook the reins, and in another minute was in the
midst of the hunters.

To the numberless questions that were put to him he only waited to
shout aloud, "We're all safe! They'll tell ye all about it," he added,
pointing to his comrades, who were now close at hand; and then,
dashing onward, made straight for home, with little Marston clinging
to his waist like a monkey.

Charlie was fresh, and so was Crusoe, so you may be sure it was not
long before they all drew up opposite the door of the widow's cottage.
Before Dick could dismount, Marston had slipped off, and was already
in the kitchen.

"Here's Dick, mother!"

The boy was an orphan, and loved the widow so much that he had come at
last to call her mother.

Before another word could be uttered, Dick Varley was in the room.
Marston immediately stepped out and softly shut the door. Reader, we
shall not open it!

Having shut the door, as we have said, Marston ran down to the edge of
the lake and yelled with delight--usually terminating each paroxysm
with the Indian war-whoop, with which he was well acquainted. Then he
danced, and then he sat down on a rock, and became suddenly aware that
there were other hearts there, close beside him, as glad as his own.
Another mother of the Mustang Valley was rejoicing over a long-lost
son.

Crusoe and his mother Fan were scampering round each other in a manner
that evinced powerfully the strength of their mutual affection.

Talk of holding converse! Every hair on Crusoe's body, every motion
of his limbs, was eloquent with silent language. He gazed into his
mother's mild eyes as if he would read her inmost soul (supposing that
she had one). He turned his head to every possible angle, and cocked
his ears to every conceivable elevation, and rubbed his nose against
Fan's, and barked softly, in every imaginable degree of modulation,
and varied these proceedings by bounding away at full speed over the
rocks of the beach, and in among the bushes and out again, but always
circling round and round Fan, and keeping her in view!

It was a sight worth seeing, and you