“Let’s go on, Henry,” he said, “afore Long Jim talks us plum’ to death, a thing I’d hate to hev happen to me, jest when we’re ’bout to reach the promised land.”
Henry pushed his way through dense bushes and trailing vines, and he noticed with intense joy that all the time the earth was growing firmer. The others followed silently in his tracks. In five minutes he emerged from the thicket, and then he could not repress an exclamation of pleasure. They had come upon a low hill, an acre perhaps in extent, as firm as any soil and well grown with thick low oaks. Where the shade was not too deep the grass was rich, and the five, the others repeating Henry’s cry of joy, threw themselves upon it and luxuriated.
“It’s fine,” said Shif’less Sol, “to lay here an’ to feel that the earth under you ain’t quiverin’ like a heap o’ jelly. I turn from one side to the other an’ then back ag’in, an’ I don’t sink into no mud, a-tall, a-tall.”
“An’ this, Paul, is the o-sis that you wuz talkin’ ’bout, an’ that I wished an’ prayed into the right place fur us?” said Long Jim.
“Oasis, Jim, not o-sis,” said Paul.
“Oasis or o-sis, it’s jest ez good to me by either name, an’ I think I’ll stick to o-sis, ’cause it’s easier to say. But, Paul, did you ever see a finer piece uv land? Did you ever see finer, richer soil? Did you ever see more splendiferous grass or grander oaks?”
“I feel about it just as you do,” laughed Paul.
Henry lay still a full ten minutes, resting after their tremendous efforts in the swamp, then he rose, walked through their oasis and discovered that at the far edge a fine large brook was running, apparently and in some mysterious way, escaping at that point the contamination of the mud, although he could see that farther on it lost itself in the swamp. But its cool, sparkling waters were a heavenly sight, and, walking back, he announced his discovery to the others.
“All of you know what you can do,” he said.
“We do,” said Paul.