ined both as carefully as they could,
and finally decided according to the best of their judgment, and went
on.

They had some doubt whether they were right, and Forester thought, as
they proceeded, that the road appeared somewhat different from the one
in which they had been travelling. However, they thought it best to go
on. After advancing about two miles, in a very circuitous direction,
they came at last to a place where several trees seemed to have been
cut away, and there were remains of several log huts. Marco was very
much interested in this discovery, and he wanted to examine the huts
very particularly. But Forester, when he found that they were not
inhabited, thought it best to lose no time, especially as it was now
beginning to be quite dark, and he urged Marco to leave the huts and
press on.

They went on for half a mile farther, when Marco, seeing a glimmer
through the trees, exclaimed that they were coming to some water.

"So it is," said Forester. "It looks like a pond or a river. If it is a
river, we're lost."

They walked on a short distance farther, and then they began to hear the
rippling of the water. In a few minutes, they were down upon the bank.
It was a small river, flowing rapidly along, between banks overhung with
bushes. Marco looked for a bridge, or for some place to cross, but they
found none. In fact, the road did not go down to the water, but seemed
to lose itself among the trees, before reaching the bank.

"This is not our road," said Forester. "We must go back."

"What road can this be?" asked Marco. "It seems to lead nowhere."

"I presume it is a logging road," replied Forester.

"What do you mean by that?" asked Marco. "Why, I suppose that those huts
must have been a logging camp, where the men lived in the winter, when
they came here to cut logs; and this is the road that they drew the logs
by, down to the water. But this summer it has been neglected. They don't
cut the logs in the summer."

"And what shall we do?" asked Marco.

"We must go back to the place where the road branched off," replied
Forester.

"Or else go and stay in the huts all night," said Marco.

"Yes," replied Forester, "we can do that. Let us go back and see."

They accordingly went back to the huts. Marco asked Forester whether he
thought they had better stay there.

"I don't know," said Forester, "Let us strike a light, and see how the
huts look."

Marco took out his match-box, and, after first