two days,"
said Oscar, "leaving everything behind us, and come back and know that
nobody has been any nearer to the place than we have, all the time? I
can't get used to it."

"My little philosopher," said his Uncle Charlie, "we are living in the
wilderness; and if you were to live here always, you would feel, by
and by, that every newcomer was an interloper; you would resent the
intrusion of any more settlers here, interfering with our freedom and
turning out their cattle to graze on the ranges that seem to be so
like our own, now. That's what happens to frontier settlers,
everywhere."

"Why, yes," said Sandy, "I s'pose we should all be like that man over
on the Big Blue that Mr. Fuller tells about, who moved away when a
newcomer took up a claim ten miles and a half from him, because, as he
thought, the people were getting too thick. For my part, I am willing
to have this part of Kansas crowded to within, say, a mile and a half
of us, and no more. Hey, Charlie?"

[Illustration: "HOME, SWEET HOME."]

But the prospect of that side of the Republican Fork being over-full
with settlers did not seem very imminent about that time. From parts
of Kansas nearer to the Missouri River than they were, they heard of a
slackening in the stream of migration. The prospect of a cold winter
had cooled the ardor of the politicians who had determined, earlier in
the season, to hold the Territory against all comers. Something like a
truce had been tacitly agreed on, and there was a cessation of
hostilities for the present. The troops had been marched back from
Lawrence to the post, and no more elections were coming on for the
present in any part of the Territory. Mr. Bryant, who was the only
ardent politician of the company, thought that it would be a good plan
to go back to Illinois for the winter. They could come out again in
the spring and bring the rest of the two families with them. The land
would not run away while they were gone.

It was with much reluctance that the boys accepted this plan of their
elders. They were especially sorry that it was thought best that the
two men should stay behind and wind up affairs, while the three lads
would go down to the river with Younkins, and thence home by steamer
from Leavenworth down the Missouri to St. Louis. But, after a few days
of debate, this was thought to be the best thing that could be done.
It was on a dull, dark November day that the boys, wading for the last
time the cold st