way through the sparkling, sun-lit waves, traversing quickly the distance which lay between the young people and their destination.  They watched the long white furrow that stretched in her wake, the cloud of black smoke which floated like a dark shadow above the laughing crests of the waves, and the flocks of sea-gulls sailing overhead, with wild shrill screams ever and anon swooping down for some bit of food flung from the ship, and then floating for miles on the waves.

How they sung ‘Life on the Ocean Wave,’ ‘Bounding Billow,’ and ‘Rocked in the Cradle of the Deep!’  How Jack chanted,—

   ‘I wish I were a fish,
      With a great long tail;
   A tiny little tittlebat,
      A wiggle or a whale,
In the middle of the great blue sea.  Oh, my!’

‘Oh, how I long to be there!’ exclaimed Philip, ‘to throw aside all the formal customs of a wicked world I abhor, and live a free life under the blue sky!’

‘Why, Philip Noble!  I never saw you inside of a house in my life,’ cried Polly.

‘Oh, yes; you’re mistaken.  I’ve been obliged to eat most of my meals in the house, and sleep there; but I don’t approve of it, and it’s a trial to be borne with meekness only when there’s no remedy for it.’

‘Besides,’ said Jack, ‘even when we are out-of-doors we are shelling the reluctant almond, poisoning the voracious gopher, pruning grape-vines, and “sich.”  Now I am only going to shoot to eat, and eat to shoot!’

‘Hope you’ve improved since last year, or you’ll have a low diet,’ murmured Phil, in an undertone.

‘The man of genius must expect to be the butt of ridicule,’ sighed Jack, meekly.

‘But you’ll not repine, although your heartstrings break, will you?’ said Polly, sympathisingly; ‘especially in the presence of several witnesses who have seen you handle a gun.’

‘How glad I am that I’m too near-sighted to shoot,’ said Geoffrey, taking off the eye-glasses that made him look so wise and dignified.  ‘I shall lounge under the trees, read Macaulay, and order the meals.’

‘I shall need an assistant about the camp,’ said Aunt Truth, smilingly; ‘but I hardly think he’ll have much time to lounge; when everything else fails, there’s always Dicky, you know.’

Geoffrey looked discouraged.

‘And, furthermore, I declare by the nose of the great Tam o’ Shanter that I will cut down every tree in the vicinity ere you shall lounge under it,’ said Jack.

‘Softly, my boy.  Hill’s blue-gum forest is not so very far away.  You’ll have your hands full,’ laughed Dr. Paul.

Here Margery and Bell joined the group after a quick walk up and down the deck.

‘Papa,’ said Bell, excitedly, ‘we certainly are nearing the place.  Do you see that bend in the shore, and don’t you remember that the landing isn’t far below?’

‘Bell’s bump of locality is immense.  There are nineteen bends in the shore exactly like that one before we reach the landing.  How many knots an hour do you suppose this ship travels, my fair cousin?’ asked Geoffrey.

‘I could tell better,’ replied Bell calmly, ‘if I could ever remember how many knots made a mile, or how many miles made a knot; but I always forget.’

‘Oh, see!  There’s a porpoise!’ cried Jack.  ‘Polly, why is a porpoise like a water-lily?’

But before he could say ‘Guess,’ Phil, Geoff, and the girls had drawn themselves into a line, and, with a whispered ‘One, two, three,’ to secure a good start, replied in concert, ‘We-give-it-up!’

‘What a deafening shout!’ cried Aunt Truth, coming out of the cabin.  ‘What’s the matter, pray?’

‘Nothing, aunty,’ laughed Polly.  ‘But we have formed a society for suppressing Jack’s conundrums, and this is our first public meeting.  How do you like the watchword?’

Aunt Truth smiled.  ‘It was very audible,’ she said.  ‘Yours is evidently not a secret society.’

‘I wish I could find out who originated this plan,’ quoth Jack, murderously.  ‘But I suppose it’s one of you girls, and I can’t revenge myself.  Oh, when will this barrier between the sexes be removed!’

‘I trust not in your lifetime,’ shuddered Polly, ‘or we might as well begin to “stand round our dying beds” at once.’

CHAPTER II
THE JOURNEY

‘Away, away, from men and towns,
To the wild wood and the downs,
To the silent wilderness.’

Whatever the distance was in reality, the steamer had consumed more time than usual, and it was quite two o’clock, instead of half-past twelve, as they had expected, before they were landed on the old and almost forgotten pier, and saw the smoke of the Orizaba as she steamed away.

After counting over their bags and packages to see if anything had been forgotten, they looked about them.

There was a dirty little settlement, a mile or two to the south, consisting of a collection of tumble-down adobe houses which looked like a blotch on the brown hillside; a few cattle were browsing near by, and the locality seemed to be well supplied with lizards, which darted over the dusty ground in all directions.  But the startling point of the landscape was that it showed no sign of human life, and Pancho’s orders had been to have Señor Don Manuel Felipe Hilario Noriega and his wood-cart on hand promptly at half-past twelve.

‘Can Pancho have forgotten?’

‘Can he have lost his way and never arrived here at all?’

‘Can Señor Don Manuel Felipe Hilario Noriega have grown tired of waiting and gone off?’

‘Has Señor Don Manuel Felipe Hilario Noriega been drinking too much aguardiente and so forgotten to come?’

‘Has Pancho been murdered by highway robbers, and served up into stew for their evening meal?’

‘With Hop Yet for dessert!  Oh, horrible!’  These were some of the questions and exclamations that greeted the ears of the lizards, and caused them to fly over the ground in a more excited fashion than ever.

‘One thing is certain.  If Pancho has been stupid enough to lose his way coming fifty miles down the coast, I’ll discharge him,’ said Dr. Winship, with decision.

‘When you find him,’ added Aunt Truth, prudently.

‘Of course.  But really, mamma, this looks discouraging; I am afraid we can’t get into camp this evening.  Shall we go up to the nearest ranch house for the night, and see what can be done to-morrow?’

‘Never!’ exclaimed the young people, with one deafening shout.

‘Never,’ echoed Philip separately.  ‘I have vowed that a bed shall not know me for three months, and I’ll keep my vow.’

‘What do you say to this, Uncle Doc?’ said Geoffrey.  ‘Suppose you go up to the storehouse and office,—it’s about a mile,—and see if the goods are there all right, and whether the men saw Pancho on his way up to the cañon.  Meanwhile, Phil and I will ride over here somewhere to get a team, or look up Señor Don Manuel Felipe Hilario Noriega.  Jack can stay with Aunt Truth and the girls, to watch developments.’

‘But, papa, can’t we pitch the camp to-night, somehow?’ asked Bell, piteously.

‘I don’t see how.  We are behindhand already; and if we get started within an hour we can’t reach the ground I selected before dark and we can’t choose any nearer one, because if Pancho is anywhere in creation he is on the