drink.

The sun lingered in the west and then sank behind the vast wall of
forest. The beams of red and gold lasted for a little space on the
surface of the river, and then faded into the universal night. Under the
great cloak of the dark, the surface of the river showed but dimly, and
the rising wind blew through the forest with a chill and uncanny sound.

The ordinary soul would have been appalled by the mighty isolation of
the wilderness, yet the river itself was not without the presence of
human life. Close to the northern shore, where the shadow of the tall
forest lay deepest, floated a long boat, containing five figures that
rested easily. Two of the crew were boys, but as tall and strong as men.
The other three were somewhat older. The boat carried four pairs of
oars, but only one man rowed, and he merely pulled on an oar from time
to time to give direction, while the current did the work. His comrades
leaned comfortably against the sides of the boat, and with keen eyes,
trained to the darkness, watched for a break in the black battlement of
the trees.

It was Henry Ware who first saw the opening. It was nearly always he who
was the first to see, and he pointed to the place where the dark line
made a loop towards the north.

"It's a wide break," he said a moment or two later. "It must be the
mouth of the river."

"You're shorely right, Henry," said Shif'less Sol, who sat just behind
him, "an' from the looks o' the break thar, it's a good, big river, too.
S'pose we pull up in it a spell afore we make a landin'."

"It seems a good idea to me," replied Henry. "What say you, Paul?"

"I'm for it," replied Paul Cotter. "I'd like to see this new river
coming down from the north, and it's pretty sure, too, that we'd be
safer camping on it for the night than on the Ohio."

Jim Hart had been guiding with a single oar. Now he took the pair in his
hands and rowed into the mouth of the tributary stream. The smaller
river, smaller only by contrast, poured a dark flood into the Ohio, and,
seeing that the current was strong, the others took oars and rowed also,
all except Paul, who was at the helm. Driven by powerful arms, the boat
went swiftly up the new river. Henry in the prow watched with all the
interest that he had for new things, and with all the need for watching
that one always had in the great forests of the Ohio Valley.

The banks of this river were higher than those of the Ohio, but were
clothed also in de