ofessor's weight,
had precipitated him into it.

"If I could get out on that branch," said Zeb, "I might be able to
bend it enough to bring my feet over him and then work back toward the
edge of the mudhole."

"It's worth trying--anything is worthy trying," agreed Jack.

Zeb took off his coat and then shinned up the tree. Then, hanging by
his hands he began working out along the branch. As he went it bent
till it hung right over the mudhole. Before long his feet dangled
above the professor's head.

"Now then, professor," panted Zeb, "take hold on my feet and work
along toward the edge of the hole with me."

The professor seized Zeb's boots with the grasp of a drowning man. The
branch cracked ominously.

"Easy thar, professor," warned Zeb earnestly. "Don't pull more'n you
can help or we'll both be in the soup."

The professor lightened his grip and slowly, hand over hand, Zeb began
the slow journey back along the branch. It was a feat only possible to
a man whose muscles were of iron. And before it was over even Zeb was
almost overcome. Perspiration streamed from his forehead and soaked
his shirt as he dropped from the branch, having accomplished the
journey and pulled the professor to the bank.

[Illustration: The professor seized Zeb's boots with the grasp of a
drowning man.--_Page_ 240.]

"That's what I call toeing a man out of trouble," punned Dick, in
the general relief that followed.

"Good thing it warn't no further," puffed Zeb, mopping his forehead.
"My arms feels as if they'd been stretched on one of them racks you
read about in the history books."

"How did it happen, professor?" asked Jack, as they scraped the mud
off the scientist.

"It's hard to say," was the response. "I was walking along, intent on
my collecting, when I came to a barren patch of ground that was
crusted over with stuff that looked like salt. I stepped out on it to
investigate and suddenly in I went. Faugh! how it smells."

"Yes, it isn't exactly perfumed," said Jack. "But how did such a place
come there?"

"It's one of those mud-springs of hot water that are found in several
places throughout the West," said the scientist. "It must have been
quiescent for some time and then the thin skin of alkaline earth
formed over it. In Europe, or if we had that spring near a large
city, it would be possible to make a fortune with it."

"In what way?" asked Dick.

"As a curative bath," replied the professor. "Every year people spe