It was now Leon's turn to be astonished.
"Yes, sir," continued Oscar. "I expect to make my living for years to come by hunting. I am sent out here to procure specimens for the museum connected with the Yarmouth University."
"Well," sighed Leon, after thinking a moment, "your way of becoming a hunter is better than mine."
"Tell me your story from beginning to end," said Oscar, "and then I'll tell you all about myself."
We know the story of Leon's adventures and mishaps; so we will not repeat what he said to Oscar.
We know everything that happened to Oscar, too, up to the time he left Sam Hynes at his mother's gate on the night he returned from Yarmouth. We dropped the thread of his narrative there, and will now go back and take it up.
Oscar's mother, you may be sure, was overjoyed to see him. The letters she had received from him during his absence had prepared her for a portion of the story he had to tell, but there were also some things for which she was not prepared, because the boy had had no time to write about them.
"I was never so surprised in my life as I was this morning," said Oscar, after he had told of his reception and experience at the university. "The committee invited me into their room and gave me a check for sixteen hundred dollars. There it is. The thousand dollars I am to use in paying my expenses, and the rest belongs to me. I shall leave it all with you, with the exception of a hundred dollars, which I shall need to buy an outfit; so you will be well provided for during my absence."
"O Oscar!" exclaimed Mrs. Preston; "I don't see how I can consent to this. You will be so far away from home and among strangers——"