Greatly astonished--for this negro was apparently too lazy to talk when he deemed it unnecessary--Diane took the birch bark and inspected it in mystification.

A most amazing message was duly inscribed thereon.
"Erastus has acquired a sinewy chicken from somebody's barn yard," it read.

"Why not bring your own plate, knife, fork, spoon and a good saw over to my hay-camp and dine with me?
"Philip." Diane stared with rising color at the load of hay.

From its ragged, fragrant bed, a tall, lean young man with a burned skin, was rising and lazily urging a nondescript yellow dog to do the same.

The dog conceivably demurred, for Philip removed him, yelping, by the simple process of seizing him by the loose skin at the back of his neck and dropping him overboard.