By this time the two had reached nearly to the foot of the hill, and within a hundred yards of the cabin.  Here they were joined by a tall, lank, lantern-jawed, awkward young man, some twenty years of age, with small, dark eyes, a long, peaked nose, and flaxen hair that floated down over his ungainly shoulders, like weeping willows over a scrub oak, and who carried in his hand a rifle nearly as long and ugly as himself.

“Why, colonel, how are ye? good even’ to ye, stranger,” was his salutation, as he came up.  “I war down by the tangle yonder, when I heerd some firing, and some yelling, and I legged it home, ahead o’ the old man, just to keep the women folks in sperets, in case they war attacked, and get a pop or so at an Injen myself; but thank the Lord, they warn’t thar; and so I ventered on, with long Nance here, to see whar they mought be.”

“Well, Isaac,” returned the one addressed as colonel, “I don’t doubt your being a brave lad, and I’ve had some opportunity o’ seeing you tried; but being is how thar’s no Indians to shoot just now, I’ll ax you to show your good qualities in another way.  This young man’s been badly wounded, and ef you’ll give him a little extra care, you’ll put me under obligations which I’ll be happy to repay whensomever needed.”

“It don’t need them thar inducements you’ve just mentioned, colonel, to rouse all my sympathies for a wounded stranger.  Rely on’t, he shan’t suffer for want o’ attention.”

“Rightly said, lad; rightly said; and so I leave him in your care.  Tender my regards to your family, for I must be off, and can’t stay to see them.”  Then turning to the wounded man, he grasped his hand and said:  “Stranger, thar’s something about you I like; I don’t say it of every man I meet; and so you may put it down for a compliment or not, just as you please.  Give me your name?”

“Algernon Reynolds.”

“Algernon Reynolds, I hope we shall meet again, though in a different manner from our introduction; but whether or no, ef you ever need the assistance of either Betsey or myself, just make it known, and we’ll do our best for you.  Good bye, sir—­good bye, Isaac!” and without waiting a reply, the speaker sprung suddenly behind a cluster of bushes near which the party stood, and the next moment was lost to view in the gathering darkness.

“A great man, that thar, sir!—­a powerful great man,” observed Isaac, gazing with admiration after the retreating form of the hunter.  “Always doing good deeds, and never looking for pay nor thanks; may God give him four-score and ten.”

“Amen to that!” returned Reynolds.  “But pray tell me his name.”

“And you don’t know him?”

“I do not.”

“And you didn’t inquire his name?”

“I did not.”

“And ef you had, sir, ten to one but he’d a given you a fictitious one, to keep clar o’ your surprise and extra thanks.  Why that, sir, war the great white hunter, Colonel Daniel Boone.”