“I hope you don’t think I’m discouraged, Dick, because so far no fish has come near my hook?” remarked Roger, when the time came to wrap their blankets around them and seek rest.
“Oh! I know you too well to believe that,” replied the other. “From now on I expect to see you doing your best to land a prize. Sooner or later success is bound to come, Roger.”
“I know it,” was the confident way the other spoke; “because I’ve always made it my business to stick to the old motto, ‘If at first you don’t succeed, try, try again.’ And even if the fish refuse to look at my bait I’ve got that spear, you remember. One of these days I’ll find a chance to launch it, and bring up a salmon worth looking at.”
Dick always liked to hear Roger talk that way. It was his constancy that in the past had won him many a battle; for Roger had a stubborn streak in his nature and would come back again and again to make new attempts. As the water by everlasting dripping will wear away a stone, so this “never-say-die” spirit often won out in the end.
Nothing disturbed the slumbers of the travelers during that first night upon the bank of the Lewis River. They started again early in the morning, for, now that the end of their journey was almost in sight, a fever began to possess them to cover the ground as rapidly as possible.
New sights opened up to their gaze with every mile of progress made. The paddles dipped into the clear water, and the sunlight, falling on the drops dripping from the blades, made each one resemble a glittering diamond.
After their life spent on the muddy Missouri it was a great pleasure to Dick and Roger to find themselves upon a stream where they could in places look down for many feet, and see the stones on the bottom, so transparent was the water.
As they floated along, waiting for the others to catch up with them, the boys’ favorite amusement was to lie still, and, looking over the gunnel of their hide canoe, watch the small fishes darting to and fro; or thrust a paddle at some clumsy turtle that had come up to see what sort of object this floating log could be.
It was not always as pleasant as this, however, for one day they had a downpour of rain that caused them to make hurriedly for the shore, and get their tents up with as little delay as possible.
The storm continued all of the following day, and an unusual amount of rain for that time of year descended. After that the water was not so clear as before, the boys noticed. There were also places where they discovered landslides had occurred, sections of the bank having slipped into the rising river.