the last night in the old shanty, and I reckon I'll see the rest of it
out."

"That's so," said the impulsive Barker, struggling violently with his
blankets. "I tell you what, boys: we just ought to make a watch-night of
it--a regular vigil, you know--until twelve at least. Hold on! I'll get
up, too!" But here Demorest arose, caught his youthful partner's bare
foot which went searching painfully for the ground in one hand, tucked
it back under the blankets, and heaping them on the top of him, patted
the bulk with an authoritative, paternal air.

"You'll just say your prayers and go to sleep, sonny. You'll want to be
fresh as a daisy to appear before Miss Kitty to-morrow early, and you
can keep your vigils for to-morrow night, after dinner, in the back
drawing-room. I said 'Good-night,' and I mean it!"

Protesting feebly, Barker finally yielded in a nestling shiver and a
sudden silence. Demorest walked back to his chair. A prolonged snore
came from Stacy's bunk; then everything was quiet. Demorest stirred up
the fire, cast a huge root upon it, and, leaning back in his chair, sat
with half-closed eyes and dreamed.

It was an old dream that for the past three years had come to him
daily, sometimes even overtaking him under the shade of a buckeye in his
noontide rest on his claim,--a dream that had never yet failed to wait
for him at night by the fireside when his partners were at rest; a dream
of the past, but so real that it always made the present seem the dream
through which he was moving towards some sure awakening.

It was not strange that it should come to him to-night, as it had often