ATTACKED IN THE PASS.—Drawn by Frenzeny.

MUFFLED.

BY WILLIAM O. STODDARD.

"Rube, me boy, what's the name of this?" exclaimed Pat Linihan, as the last wagon of the mining outfit was hauled into position, and the grizzled veteran he spoke to was dragging the harness from his favorite span of mules.

"The name of it? Do you mean this hollow we've pulled up in?"

"Dade an' I do, thin. Ye've put a name of some kind to ivery rock an' bush we've seen the day."

"Well, then, mebbe it's the Chico Valley. It's a place I'll be glad to git out of with all the hair on my head."

"It's a swate spot, for all that. Is it near here thim Wallopy red-skins lives that makes it a bad boordin'-house for white min?"

"Yes, this is just the place. But there isn't many of 'em, and we didn't send 'em word we was comin'. Mebbe we'll find our way through the pass before they scent us. They're venomous, they are. Worst kind."

The two mules had been standing as if they were listening to him, but now, as old Rube cast them loose, the off mule suddenly threw up his heels and set out at a sharp trot into the grass, while his mate stretched his long neck forward in a sonorous bray.

"That'll do, Gov'nor," remarked Rube. "We all know you kin do it. You and the Senator had better jest feed yer level best while yer chance is good. Mebbe you'll be an Indian's mule yet, before you die."

"Saints preserve thim, thin. It's foine mules they are," said Pat, very soberly. "Misther Adams, was ye hearin' the charakther he gave the place we're in?"

"Is there any danger, Rube?—any real danger?"

"Not if we can find our way through the pass, Charlie. It's more like the neck of a bottle than anything else. Hope they haven't corked it up with rocks for us."

A tall, slightly built boy was Charlie Adams, and his bright blue eyes were wide open, with a look in which there was more fun and love of adventure than fear of anything—even of Hualapais[1] Indians.

He had been staring around the broad level valley while the miners were going into camp, and it did seem as if he had never looked upon anything more beautiful. The grass was so luxuriant and green; the scattered groves had been set down exactly in the right places; the mountains arose so grandly on every side; surely there could not have been imagined a prettier picture in a more wonderful frame. He said so to Rube Sarrow, but all the reply he got from the grim old wagon-master was,

"Ye-es, and the red-skins mean to keep it. Thar's been more than one outfit wiped out a-tryin' to squeeze through the Union Pass."

The wagons of the train were drawn up in two rows, about fifty yards apart, the light "ambulance," from which Rube had unhitched the Governor and the Senator, was pulled across one of the open spaces at the end, and a brisk fire had been started at the other. The ground so inclosed contained room enough to "corral" all the mules and horses of the train in case of an attack, and the members of that exploring party were likely to be able to defend such a fort against any ordinary band of red men.

Not a sign of the presence of Indians in the neighborhood had yet been discovered, and before the middle of the afternoon the scouts sent out came in with a couple of fat deer.

"That looks well," growled old Rube. "The valley hasn't been hunted out lately. Mebbe we'll git through all right."

The animals were watched pretty carefully, nevertheless, and they all had a good long rest and time to feed.

"They'd betther make the best of it," said Pat Linihan to Charlie Adams. "It's a long pull and a hard one they've got before thim. Wud thim red-skins take the skelp of a mule, do ye s'pose?"

"They'd give more for yours, Pat. They'd risk almost anything for hair as red as you have. Light their pipes, you know."

"That's more'n I kin do wid