lands as well, and for young fellows who had not yet attained their majority, all of the scouts had experienced thrills calculated to make men of mature age proud.

And yet in spite of all this they were genuine boys, with warm hearts, and fond of practical joking. Seated around the jolly fire after disposing of supper, while the two guides attended to cleaning up, Jimmy entertained his mates with a series of rollicking songs, accompanied by Teddy on his mandolin, which he had somehow managed to smuggle along, in spite of a careful watch on the part of Ned, who did not wish to take a single article that was not indispensable, for he knew the gigantic task that lay ahead of them.

Jimmy has as usual been overboard during the late afternoon. It was not a voluntary swim the comical chum had been enjoying, either; these plunges never were, but it seemed as though Jimmy must lose his balance once in so often just while the canoes were negotiating through some wild rapids, and in consequence he had to make the passage clinging to the gunwale.

His red sweater was hanging on a bush to dry in the heat of the fire. It looked unusually brilliant as seen in the glow of the leaping flames. Jimmy was very proud of that same old sweater, which had been with him through so many campaigns that it showed signs of wear and tear. But though he had another nice navy-blue one in his waterproof clothes bag, Jimmy persisted in donning the ancient article every blessed day, in spite of the appeals of his chums.

Ned as usual was poring over his well-thumbed chart. Every day he marked the new ground they had covered, and very seldom had he found cause to doubt the correctness of the two guides. And whenever this had happened it turned out that they were right, and the map wrong.

"Well," Frank finally broke out with, "so far we haven't run across anything in the shape of a rival expedition, though Ned seemed to think in the start that was what would happen to us."

"I haven't changed my mind yet," observed the party mentioned, looking up from examining his chart. "We understood that the syndicate that is trying to unload this wonderful new mining tract they claim will be richer than Mesauba on Jack's father as a speculation, knew about our being sent up here on some secret mission. They could easily guess that we meant to find out if half of the big claim they made was true, and that on our report Mr. Bosworth would base any action he might take. Now it was to be such a tremendously big deal that under the conditions, if so be there was something crooked about the claims they made, you can understand that it would pay them handsomely to shunt us off the track, or else salt the mine, and make us think it would be as rich a proposition as their prospectus set out."

"But," interrupted Jack, "who could they get to do their crooked work away up here in this forlorn country, where we haven't run across a living being since we met that trapper going south with his winter's catch of pelts?"

"Oh! money will do lots of things," answered Ned. "Given a soft berth, with good pay, and plenty to eat, and scores of Indian half-breeds, timber cruisers, guides out of employment along the salmon fishing streams of the Dominion, and trappers loafing through an off season, would jump at the bait. There'd be plenty to enlist under the lead of a bold man hired by the syndicate; if, as we more than half believe, their claim is a great swindle which they mean to hang about Jack's father's neck."

"Francois says we will always have to be prepared, and as that is the motto of Boy Scouts all over the known world, it isn't likely to seem new to us," Frank Shaw remarked, a little boastfully it must be confessed, for having passed through so many strange happenings in times past had given him a touch of what Jimmy was inclined to call the "swelled head," though any one would have been justified for feeling proud of such a record of wonderful things accomplished.

The scouts having started on the subject of their mission continued to discuss it from various angles. In this way they often hit upon suggestions, because one remark would bring out another until some fellow chanced to open up a new field of conjecture.

They were deep in the matter, and all taking a hand in the discussion, when Francois, the dark-faced voyageur, suddenly started to his knees with a cry of warning. At the same time the boys became aware of the fact that a strange rushing and pounding noise was rapidly bearing down upon the little camp on the river bank.

Jimmy happened to be sitting cross-legged like a Turk, a favorite attitude of his, and becoming excited he could not get up as rapidly as his chums.

In consequence of this he seemed to be in the way of some huge body that rushed the camp, scattering the fire, and rending the branches of the tree under which the exploring party had settled for the night.

It was all over in a few seconds. The camp was in an uproar, one of the tents down flat, the fire in danger of communicating to the brush, and Jimmy squealing on his back, where the sudden rush of the mysterious monster had thrown him.

"Help! Help!" Jimmy was shouting, kicking wildly as he roared. "Keep off me, you wild elephant! Somebody shoot him, quick, before he steps on me!"

"Here, stop that kicking, if you want to be helped up, do you hear, Jimmy!" exclaimed Frank, who had hastened to the assistance of the comrade in distress. "Are you much hurt; and did the beast trample on you any?"

Jimmy began to feel of his legs and arms, and upon discovering himself apparently as sound as a dollar, grinned sheepishly. Meanwhile the two guides had hastened, with the help of Ned and Jack, to gather the fire together again. Teddy had snatched up the nearest rifle and was down on one knee, peering out through the semi-darkness as though anticipating a return rush on the part of the unknown monster that had created such confusion in the camp.

"No great damage done, after all, seems like, if Jimmy says he's all right," remarked Ned, now beginning to let a broad smile creep over his face, for seeing Jimmy doubled up had been a ludicrous spectacle not soon to be forgotten.

"But what in creation was it that put the kibosh all over me like that?" demanded the one who had been knocked over by the mad rush of the invader.

Ned glanced toward Francois, and the voyageur simply said:

"Bull moose—him very much mad, charge camp like that!"

"Well, I should think he must have been," Frank Shaw declared. "Why, if we'd had a little more warning we might have met him with a volley of hot lead that'd have laid him out dead. Now that Francois says so, I do believe he looked pretty much on the order of a monstrous moose bull. I certainly saw his horns, and they were full grown, because the rutting season is long since past."

"But what makes a moose get his mad up?" Jack asked. "We didn't do a single thing to rile him, that I know of, but were sitting here as easy as you please, when all at once he charges through the camp. Why, say, he nearly carried off some of our property, when he knocked down that tent. Look at the rip his horns made in the tanned canvas, would you? Some more sewing for Teddy here, to mend the rip."

"Francois, do bull moose often act in that way?" asked Teddy, still gripping the repeating rifle, as though not fully convinced that their would be no repetition of the savage onslaught.

The guide shook his head.

"Know only