"I don't know nowt of his history, but I think things must have gone hard with him somehow, and he came out here for excitement more than for making money. But there's nothing reckless about him; he don't drink, and he don't gamble, and it says a lot for a young fellow in New Orleans that he don't do one or the other. And he can fight, he can; there ain't no doubt about that. Why, I saw him give the biggest kind of a thrashing to the bully of a lumber camp, where we moored up alongside one night, as ever you seed. The chap was big enough to eat him, but he didn't have no kind of show. The young un just hit him where he liked, and in five minutes that chap's face was a thing to see, and the lad never got so much as a scratch. I wouldn't have thought as a man could have used his hands like that if I hadn't been thar. I shall be right-down sorry to lose him." "I knew well-nigh when I took him on that he was not likely to stay, Hiram; he said as much. He wanted to get to know something about the ways of the country before he decided upon anything. If all young fellows would do as he did, go to work for a few months, instead of loafing about spending their money, and getting into bad ways, and among bad fellows, it would be better for them; he has only drawn a few dollars for his expenses--when he was down the last time--since he came to work, so he has got a good sum due to him. I will have a talk with him myself. There are a good many parties starting from here and taking the Santa Fé route; but, taking them all in all, I don't think I should recommend him to hang on to one of them." "No, I should guess they would be a pretty hard lot who would go out from here--gamblers, and horse-thieves, and runaway sailors, and Mexican fighters--neither good to travel with or good to work with; he had better go up and strike from St. Louis." "He had better go higher still, Hiram; there's a northern route, and I hear a lot of the Western men are making across that. However, I will talk to him." That afternoon Frank went into Mr. Willcox's little office. "Hiram has been speaking in very high terms of you, and I find that I am indebted to you for the saving of the boat, with what cargo she had on board, which Hiram said he had altogether given up as lost. You seem to have been in a position of very great danger, and to have had an extraordinarily narrow escape of your lives. However, I can understand that you are not content to settle down for life on the Mississippi, but I can tell you that with enterprise, judgment, and steadiness there is fortune to be made here still. I am not surprised that the gold-seeking mania has got hold of you."