"Do you know what the Big Bone Lick is, Henry?" asked Paul eagerly.
"No," replied Henry, wondering at his chum's excitement.
"Why it's the most wonderful place in all the world!" said Paul, jumping up and down in his wish to tell quickly. "There was a hunter here last winter who spoke to me about it. I didn't believe him then, it sounded so wonderful, but Mr. Pennypacker says it's all true. There's a great salt spring, boiling out of the ground in the middle of a kind of marsh, and all around it, for a long distance, are piled hundreds of large bones, the bones of gigantic animals, bigger than any that walk the earth to-day."
"See here, Paul," said Henry scornfully, "you can't stuff my ears with mush like that. I guess you were reading one of the master's old romances, and then had a dream. Wake up, Paul!"
"It's true every word of it!"
"Then if there were such big animals, why don't we see 'em sometimes running through the forest?"
"My, they've all been dead millions of years and their bones have been preserved there in the marsh. They lived in another geologic era—that's what Mr. Pennypacker calls it—and animals as tall as trees strolled up and down over the land and were the lords of creation."
Henry puckered his lips and emitted a long whistle of incredulity.
"Paul," he said, reprovingly, "you do certainly have the gift of speech."
But Paul was not offended at his chum's disbelief.