see this soil is largely composed of sand, and water runs out of it
very rapidly if it has anywhere to run to. I made the ditch for it to
run into, and if you'll examine the ground here you'll find that my
trench is doing its work very well indeed."

"That's a fac'," said Sid Russell, feeling of the sand.

"I say Sam," said Billy Bowlegs, squaring himself before Sam, with
arms akimbo.

"Well, say it then," replied Sam, laughing, and assuming a similar
attitude.

"If there is any little thing, about any sort o' thing, that you don't
happen to know, I wish you'd just oblige me by telling me what it is."

"I haven't time, Billy," laughed Sam, "the list of things I don't know
is too long to begin this late in the evening."

"Well, you've made me feel like an idiot every day since we started on
this tramp, by knowing all about things, and doing little things that
any fool ought to have thought of, and not one of us fools did."

"Come, supper is ready," replied Sam.

After supper the boys busied themselves drying their clothes by the
roaring fire of pitch pine which blazed and crackled in front of the
tent, making the air within like that of an oven. While they were
at it they fell to talking, of course, and it is equally a matter of
course that they talked about the subject which was uppermost in