“Yes, Henry,” replied Jim in a melancholy tone, “I’m sick; sick uv all this jawin’, sick uv seein’ things pulled here, an’ then pulled yonder, sick uv hearin’ people lyin’, knowin’ that they’re lyin’, and knowin’ that other people know that they’re lyin’.”

“Why, Jim,” said Paul, who had a twinkle in his eye, “that’s diplomacy, and the man who practises it is called a diplomatist or diplomat.  It’s considered a great accomplishment.”

“It ain’t so considered by me, an’ I’m bein’ heard from,” said Long Jim with great emphasis.  “Them dy-plo-may-tists or dy-plo-maws may reckon theirselves pow’ful big boys, but I’ve got another an’ better name fur ‘em, and it’s spelled with jest four letters, uv which the furst is l an’ the last is r, an’ them that comes in between are i an’ a, with the i first.  Why, Paul, it makes me plum’ sick, all these goin’s on.  In a big town like this, full uv Spaniards an’ Frenchmen an’ Injuns an’ niggers an’ mixed breeds, an’ the Lord knows what, you can never tell nuth’in’ ’bout nobody, ‘cept that he says what he don’t believe, an’ that he ain’t what he is.

“I guess I’m in love more with the big woods than ever.  Thar things is what they is.  A buffaler don’t pretend to be a b’ar.  He’d be ashamed to be caught tryin’ to play sech a trick, an’ a b’ar has the same respect fur hisself; he’d never dream uv sayin’ in his b’ar language, ’Look at me, admire me, see what a fine big buffaler I am!’ An’ I’ve a lot uv respeck fur the Injun, too.  He’s an Injun an’ he don’t say he ain’t.  He don’t come sneakin’ along claimin’ that he’s an old friend uv the family, he jest up an’ lets drive his tomahawk at your head, ef he gits the chance, an’ makes no bones ’bout it.  I’d a heap ruther be killed by a good honest Injun who wuz pantin’ fur my blood an’ didn’t pretend that he wuzn’t pantin’, than be done to death down here, in some cur’us, unbeknown, hole-in-the-dark way, by a furrin’ man who couldn’t speak a real word of the decent English language, but who wuz tryin’ to let on all the time that he hated to do it.”

Long Jim stopped, breathing hard with his long speech and anger.  Shif’less Sol rose, walked across the room, and solemnly held out his hand to his comrade.

“Jim,” he said, “you don’t often talk sense, but you’re talkin’ a heap o’ it now.  Shake.”

Long Jim shook and added with a grin: 

“When me an’ you agree, Sol, ‘bout anythin’, it’s shorely right.”

Then they fell silent for a while, each thinking in his own way of what had occurred.  Henry Ware walked to one of the windows and looked out for a long while.  He relished little the idea of being a prisoner for the second time, even if the second imprisonment were a sort of courtesy affair.  He saw from the windows the roofs of houses amid green foliage and he knew that only a few hundred yards beyond lay the great forest, which, now in the freshest and tenderest tints of spring, rolled away unbroken, save for the few scratches that the French or Spanish had made, for thousands of miles, and for all he knew to the Arctic Circle itself.