“Captain,” he remarked slowly and thoughtfully, “you ’ve no idea the trouble that negro is to me.  Would you believe it? he actually left my nail-brush behind at Detroit, and not another to be had for love or money this side of Montreal!  And only last night he mislaid a box of rouge, and, by Saint Denis!  I hardly dare hope there is so much as an ounce of it in the whole party.”

“I rather suspect not,” was the somewhat crusty reply; “yet if a bit of bear’s grease could be made to serve your turn, we might possibly find some among us.”

“I know not its virtue,” admitted the Frenchman gravely; “yet if it reddens the lips it might be useful.  But that which I had came from the shop of Jessold in Paris, and is beyond all price.”

We were ten days upon this forest journey, from the time of our crossing the Maumee; and they were hard days, even to those of us long habituated to the hardships of border travel.  Indeed, I know few forms of exertion that so thoroughly test the mettle of men as journeying across the wilderness.  There are no artificial surroundings, either to inspire or restrain; and insensibly humanity returns to natural conditions, permitting the underlying savage to gain ascendency.  I have seen more than one seemingly polished gentleman, resplendent with all the graces of the social code, degenerate into a surly brute with only a few hours of such isolation and the ceaseless irritation of the trail.  Yet I must acknowledge that De Croix accepted it all without a murmur, and as became a man.  His entire plaint was over the luxuries he must forego, and he made far more ado about a bit of dust soiling his white linen than about any real hardship of the march.  ’T is my memory that he rather grew upon us; for his natural spirits were so high that he sang where others swore, and found cause for amusement and laughter in much that tested sorely even the Indian-like patience of Wells.  He was like a boy, this gayly perfumed dandy of the French court; but beneath his laces and ribbons, his affectations and conceits, there hid a stout heart that bade him smile where other men would lie down and die.  He companioned mostly with Jordan as we journeyed, for Wells never could become reconciled to his mincing ways; yet I confess now that I began to value him greatly, and longed more than once to join with the two who rode in our advance, cheering their wearisome way with quips of fancy and snatches of song.  He knew it too, the tantalizing rascal, and would frequently send back a biting squib over his shoulder, hoping thus to draw me away from the silent grim-faced soldier beside whom I held place.