nd worry. Nerves want a little tone, eh? as we doctors
say. My dear boy, I shall have to feel your pulse and put you to bed
for a day or two. This is a nice high and dry place: suppose we camp
here for a little, and--"

"Oh no, no, doctor," I cried.

"But I say, Oh yes, yes. Why, Joe, you're not afraid of a dose of
physic, are you? You want something, that's evident. Boys of your age
don't have despondent fits without a cause."

"I have only been thinking a little more about home, and--my poor
father," I said with a sigh.

"My dear Joe," said the doctor, "once for all I protest against that
despondent manner of speaking. `My poor father!' How do you know he is
poor? Bah! lad: you're a bit down, and I shall give you a little
quinine. To-morrow you will rest all day."

"And then?" I said excitedly.

"Then," he said thoughtfully--"then? Why, then we'll have a fishing or
a shooting trip for a change, to do us both good, and we'll take Jack
Penny and Jimmy with us."

"Let's do that to-morrow, doctor," I said, "instead of my lying here in
camp."

"Will you take your quinine, then, like a good boy?" he said laughingly.

"That I will, doctor--a double dose," I exclaimed. "A double dose you
shall take, Joe, my lad," he said; and to my horror he drew a little
flat silver case out of his pocket, measured out a little light white
powder on the blade of a knife into our pannikin, squeezed into it a few
drops of the juice of a lemon-like fruit of which we had a pretty good
number every day, filled up with water, and held it for me to drink.

"Oh, I say, doctor!" I exclaimed, "I did not think I should be brought
out here in the wilderness to be physicked."

"Lucky fellow to have a medical man always at your side," he replied.
"There, sip it up. No faces. Pish! it wasn't nasty, was it?"

"Ugh! how bitter!" I cried with a shudder.

"Bitter? Well, yes; but how sweet to know that you have had a dose of
the greatest medicine ever discovered. There, now, lie down on the
blanket near the fire here, never mind being a little warm, and go to
sleep."

I obeyed him unwillingly, and lay attentively watching the doctor's
thoughtful face and the fire. Then I wondered whether we should have
that savage beast again which had haunted our camp at our first
starting, and then I began to dose off, and was soon dreaming of having
found my father, and taken him in triumph back to where my mother was
waiting to receive