outbreaks of emotional extravagance.

"They make good settlers, as a rule," he commented. "But, as they
don't speak English, how does the fellow get on with them?"

"Told me he was a philologist, when I asked him; then he allowed two or
three of them were mystics, and he was something in that line. He was
a doctor once and got fired out of England for something he shouldn't
have done. Anyhow, the Dubokars are like the rest of us--good, bad,
and pretty mixed--and the crowd back of Sweetwater belong to the last.
At first, some of them didn't believe it was right to work horses, and
made the women drag the plow; and they had one or two other habits that
brought the police down on them. After that they've given no trouble,
but they get on a jag of some kind now and then."

Blake nodded. He knew that the fanatic with untrained and unbalanced
mind is liable under the influence of excitement to indulge in crude
debauchery; but it was strange that a man of culture, such as Clarke
appeared to be, should take part in these excesses. He had, however,
no interest in the fellow; and he turned the talk on to other matters,
until it got cold and they went to sleep.

Starting early the next morning, they reached Sweetwater after an
uneventful journey, and found it by no means an attractive place.
South of it, rolling prairie ran back, grayish white with withered
grass, to the skyline; to the north, straggling poplar bluffs and
scattered Jack-pines crowned the summits of the ridges. A lake gleamed
in a hollow, a slow creek wound across the foreground in a deep ravine,
and here and there in the distance was an outlying farm. A row of
houses followed the crest of the ravine, some built of small logs, and