“I sympathize with you, Joshua,” said Joe.  “We may as well be movin’ on, as you suggest.  We may come to some cabin, or party of travelers.”

So they mounted their beasts and started.  Joe went ahead, for his animal was much better than the sorry nag which Mr. Bickford bestrode.  The latter walked along with an air of dejection, as if life were a burden to him.

“If I had this critter at home, Joe, I’ll tell you what I’d do with him,” said Mr. Bickford, after a pause.

“Well, what would you do with him?”

“I’d sell him to a sexton.  He’d be a first-class animal to go to funerals.  No danger of his runnin’ away with the hearse.”

“You are not so hungry but you can joke, Joshua.”

“It’s no joke,” returned Mr. Bickford.  “If we don’t raise a supply of provisions soon, I shall have to attend my own funeral.  My mind keeps running on them johnny-cakes.”

They rode on rather soberly, for the exercise and the fresh morning air increased their appetites, which were keen when they started.

Mr. Bickford no longer felt like joking, and Joe at every step looked anxiously around him, in the hope of espying relief.

On a sudden, Mr. Bickford rose in his Stirrups and exclaimed in a tone of excitement: 

“I see a cabin!”

“Where?”

“Yonder,” said the Yankee, pointing to a one-story shanty, perhaps a quarter of a mile away.

“Is it inhabited, I wonder?”

“I don’t know.  Let us go and see.”

The two spurred their horses, and at length reached the rude building which had inspired them with hope.  The door was open, but no one was visible.

Joshua was off his horse in a twinkling and peered in.

“Hooray!” he shouted in rejoicing accents.  “Breakfast’s ready.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean that I’ve found something to eat.”

On a rude table was an earthen platter full of boiled rice and a stale loaf beside it.

“Pitch in, Joe,” said Joshua.  “I’m as hungry as a wolf.”

“This food belongs to somebody.  I suppose we have no right to it.”

“Right be hanged.  A starving man has a right to eat whatever he can find.”

“Suppose it belongs to a fire-eater, or a man from Pike County?”

“We’ll eat first and fight afterward.”

Joe did not feel like arguing the matter.  There was an advocate within him which forcibly emphasized Joshua’s arguments, and he joined in the banquet.

“This bread is dry as a chip,” said Mr. Bickford.  “But no matter.  I never thought dry bread would taste so good.  I always thought rice was mean vittles, but it goes to the right place just now.”

“I wonder if any one will have to go hungry on our account?” said Joe.

“I hope not, but I can’t help it,” returned Mr. Bickford.  “Necessity’s the fust law of nature, Joe.  I feel twice as strong as I did twenty minutes ago.”