ving so long among the Indians that he would not remember
his father and mother when he saw them; he would like to stay till he was
pretty nearly grown up, and then come back in a chief's dress, with eagle
plumes all down his back and a bow in his hand, and scare them a little
when he first came in the house and then protect them from the tribe and
tell them who he was, and enjoy their surprise. But he hated to say this
to Jim Leonard, because he would think he was afraid to live with the
Indians always. He hardly dared to ask him what the Indians would do to
him if they did not adopt him, but he thought he had better, and Jim said:

"Oh, burn you, maybe. But it ain't likely but what they'll adopt you; and
if they do they'll take you down to the river, and wash you and scrub
you, so's to get all the white man off, and then pull out your hair, a
hair at a time, till there's nothing but the scalp-lock left, so that your
enemies can scalp you handy; and then you're just as good an Indian as
anybody, and nobody can pick on you, or anything. The thing is how to find
the canal-boat."

The next morning at school it began to be known that Pony Baker was going
to run off on a canal-boat to see the Indians, and all the fellows said
how he ought to do it. One of the fellows said that he ought to get to
drive the boat horses, and another that he ought to hide on board in the
cargo, and come out when the boat was passing the reservation; and another
that he ought to go for a cabin-boy on one of the passenger-packets, and
then he could get to the Indians twice as soon as he could on a
freight-boat. But the trouble was that Pony was so little that they did
not believe they would take him either for a driver or a cabin-boy; and he
said he was not going to hide in the cargo, because the boats were full
of rats, and he was not going to have rats running over him all the time.

Some of the fellows thought this showed a poor spirit in Pony, and wanted
him to take his dog along and hunt the rats; they said he could have lots
of fun; but others said that the dog would bark as soon as he began to
hunt the rats, and then Pony would be found out and put ashore in a
minute. The fellows could not think what to do till at last one of them
said:

"You know Piccolo Wright?"

"Yes."

"Well, you know his father has got a boat?"

"Yes. Well?"

"Well, and he's got a horse, too; and everything."

"Well, what of it?"

"Get Piccolo to hook the