"Now, Charley," said Jack, "none of that. We've been in a tighter place than this, and you especially ought not to be downhearted. You're ever so much better off than you were this time last night, when that darkey had you treed; and you're better off now than Ned is, with his game foot."
"Poor fellow," said Charley, looking at Ned as he limped into the hut with difficulty.
"The fact is," continued Jack, "we're tired out, and so things look blue to us, but they'll look better in the morning. You see we got no sleep last night, besides wearing ourselves out with anxiety and excitement, and we have worked like convicts all day. We'll feel better and brighter after we get some sleep, and things that look gloomy and discouraging now will look bright and hopeful enough to-morrow morning."
"That's true," said Ned, coming out of the hut again, "and it would be much better for us if we could quit work right now, and sleep for ten hours without waking, but we can't."
"Why not?" asked Charley, who was utterly worn out.
"Because we've some more work to do that must be done before we sleep," answered Ned. "What we have done for defence is of no good at all as it stands. We must have a barrier around the camp to-night."
"How shall we make one?" asked Jack.
"With brush. We have plenty of it already cut in the shape of the tree tops we've trimmed off in getting our stockade poles."
"Brush won't make a very good defence," muttered Charley.
"No, but it will be much better than no defence at all," replied Ned. "It isn't easy to climb over a well-packed brush pile, particularly if the brush is so laid that all the branches point outward, and that's the way we'll lay it. It won't take long to make a wall of that kind, and we can remove it little by little, as we set the poles hereafter."