“How?” said the doctor, and the boys pricked up their ears to listen to the conversation.
“Haven’t lost a mule; always got over some of the ground to bring us nearer to the place we’re looking for; and the way in which we are enjoying ourselves in this compound frolic of a picnic is wonderful.”
“Enjoying, eh? Well, I’m glad you take it so.”
“Oh, I think we’re been wonderfully lucky, seeing what might have happened.”
“Do you hear, boys?” said the doctor. “That’s the spirit to take our journey in. But look here, Griggs, we’ve been trenching too much on our stores, and that’s bad.”
“The mules don’t think so, sir,” said the American, laughing; “but as we can’t buy fresh, going on in this way, perhaps we had better be on the lookout a little more for the pot, and leave the stores as much alone as we can.”
“Yes,” said the doctor. “I say, don’t let anything eatable go by. By the way, you’re deviating a little from the course we laid down this morning.”
“Just a little, sir,” replied Griggs. “It was Skeeter’s doing.”
“Oh, I did not know that the mule took the lead.”
“He doesn’t always, sir, but sometimes he stops short, lifts up that muzzle of his, lays his ears flat down, and sings one of those pleasant little airs of his; and when he does that I’ve noticed more than once that it means he smells water somewhere. So this time when he snapped at a fly trying to lay eggs in his skin, and bore off a little to the left, I didn’t interfere.”