the host. "I might have risked taking your daughter across the river in a rowboat last night if it had been safe to trust her on the other side after dark. There are Indians camped along the way; and, though they are peaceful enough when they are compelled to be, they are not trustworthy under all circumstances. But my servant, Siwash, has breakfast ready and waiting. I can't allow you to go on till you have broken your fast."
The host conducted his guests into the dugout to a table loaded with a bountiful supply of coffee, fish, venison, hot biscuit, beans, and wapatoes,—the last • two dishes being deftly exhumed from the depths of a bed of ashes, where they had been cooked to perfection during the night.
"Your servant is an artist in his business," said the Captain, in praise of the food.
"Yes, Captain. I found him a slave, and, seeing he was superior to most of his class, I purchased him for what you would consider a trifle. Then, as time wore on, I encouraged him to buy his freedom from me. He is now trying to purchase his sister; but he finds it slow work, as her value increases as she gets older and better able to dig camas and tan buffalo hides."
"It is awful to enslave the Indians!" cried Jean. " The Government ought to stop it!"
"Slavery among the Indians is no worse than among the negroes," said her host, with an admiring smile.
"Women are not responsible for slavery, sir," said Jean.
"But women are very ardent defenders of slavery wherever it exists, my daughter," added her father, gravely.
"That *s because they themselves are servants without wages, daddie. Mother used to say that the worst slavedrivers she ever saw down South were the overseers who were slaves themselves. Women are not angels, but they are doing the best they can without political power."
