iver, to procure
it himself, while the miners acted as convoys.

Late one afternoon, they reached a singular formation in the prairie.
It was so rough and uneven that they proceeded with great difficulty
and at a slow rate of speed. While advancing in this manner, they
found they had unconsciously entered a small narrow valley, the bottom
of which was as level as a ground floor. The sides contracted until
less than a hundred feet separated them, while they rose to the hight
of some eight or ten feet, and the bottom remained compact and firm,
making it such easy traveling for the steam man, that the company
followed down the valley, at a slow pace, each, however, feeling some
misgiving as to the propriety of the course.

'It runs in the right direction,' said young Brainerd, 'and if it only
keeps on as it began, it will prove a very handy thing for us.'

'Hyar's as afeared it ain't goin' to keep on in that style,' remarked
Baldy; 'howsumever, you can go ahead awhile longer.'

'Naow, that's what I call real queer,' remarked Ethan Hopkins, who was
stretching his legs by walking alongside the steamer.

'And it's meself that thinks the same,' added Mickey, puffing away at
his short black pipe. 'I don't understand it, as me father obsarved
when they found fault with him for breaking another man's head.'

'Ef we git into trouble, all we've got ta do is to back out,' remarked
Baldy, as a sort of apology for continuing his advance.

'This fellow doesn't know how to go backward,' said Johnny, 'but if it
prove necessary, we can manage to turn him round.'

'All right, go ahead.'

At the same moment, the limber Yankee sprung into the wagon, and the
steam man started ahead at a speed which was as fast as was prudent.

However, this delightful means of progress was brought to an
unexpected standstill, by the sudden and abrupt termination of the
valley. It ended completely as though it were an uncompleted canal,
the valley rising so quickly to the level of the prairie, that there
was no advancing any further, nor turning, nor in fact was there any
possible way of extricating themselves from the difficulty, except by
working the steam man around, and withdrawing by the same path that
they had entered by.

'Well, here we are' remarked the boy, as they came to a standstill,
'and what is to be done?'

'Get out of it,' was the reply of Hopkins, who advanced several yards
further, until he came up on the prairie again, so as to