ed antipathy
for all crawling things, and would never handle even an inoffensive
garter-snake; indeed, slimy greenbacked frogs he abominated, claiming
that they had the same clammy feeling as snakes.

"Why, yes, a couple whipped across the trail back there," Bristles
admitted.

"Not rattlers, I hope?" ejaculated Colon, coming to a sudden stop, as he
turned an apprehensive look upon his companion.

"No," Bristles told him, with a scornful inflection in his voice, for he
did not share Colon's antipathy toward crawling reptiles, and could not
understand how any fellow could be so foolish as to shiver at sight of a
mere wriggling object. "Fred says it's too early for rattlers to show
out of their dens. One was a fair-sized black snake, and the other might
have been an adder; he was short and stumpy, and had a flat head."

"Just as poisonous as anything that crawls," said Colon, with a shudder,
and an involuntary hasty look around him. As a rule, he was far from
being nervous, and yet when a stick that had bent under Fred's weight
suddenly sprang back into shape again, the tall runner gave a low cry of
alarm, and even dropped the leg of the dog that he had been clinging to
so sturdily all that distance.

Not liking to be joked about his fears, Colon made out that a thorn had
jabbed him in the leg, and bending down he started to rubbing vigorously
at his ankle. Bristles, apparently, was aware of the true state of
affairs, for he grinned as he waited for the other to assist him once
more.

"These thorns do stick you right smart when they get a chance at a bare
shin, for a fact, Colon," he went on to observe, grimly, "but so long as
they don't draw blood, the damage's not apt to amount to much, I reckon.
There's Fred disappeared from sight, and we'll have to hurry if we want
to catch up with him before we strike that road, which I calculate can't
be a great way off."

It happened that they were passing over some rather rough country just
then, with a number of dark-looking gullies intersecting their course.
In places it was even necessary for them to drop down into these and then
climb up on the opposite side. This took time, but the boys fancied they
must be close to the road they had been aiming to reach.

"See anything of Fred, yet?" asked Bristles. "You're such a tall fellow
you c'n spy a heap farther than me."

Colon looked, and then shook his head.

"He's nowhere around, as far as I c'n see," he remarked