"The blue peaks are there, at any rate," he said to himself, as he descended to the plain, "and I will make toward them. If I can reach them, I know I shall be all right; and if I can't--well, I will die as near to them as possible." When he regained the place where he had left his pony he had been absent from it nearly, if not quite, an hour. Now it seemed as though he must have made some mistake in retracing his steps, for the animal was nowhere to be seen. There were his tracks, though, and there was the slender shaft of rotten sandstone to which he had been fastened, freshly broken off, and lying there upon the ground. "Oh, what a fool I am! What a poor blind fool!" groaned the boy, as the full extent of this fresh disaster was made plain to him. "If I had only let the brute have his head in the first place, he would have carried me to the nearest water. I have often heard Mort say that a horse has a better knowledge of such things than a man; and of course he knows, for Mort knows everything. He knew that I was no more fit to take care of myself than a child, and he knew I would get lost. Oh, why didn't he send me back home, or tie me up, or do something to save me from my own foolish self? The dear old fellow won't be bothered with me any more, though, for we shall never meet again in this world. Poor Mort, how he must be suffering! But I can't die here. I can't! It is too horrible! If I could only reach those blue mountains. I wonder if there is the slightest chance of it? I wonder how long a fellow can live and travel without food or water? "Water! Oh, for a long cool drink of it! How gladly would I give the wealth of the world to lie beside one of those springs that we passed a day or two ago, and drink and drink and drink! Or the well at grandfather's. Or the trout brook up in the Alleghanies. Or-- But I mustn't think of such things or I shall go crazy, and that will be the end of everything. I will make a try, though, for those blue mountains, for I am sure there are springs and lovely streams in their dark cool valley. If I can only reach them! Oh, what joy! And if I don't-- Well, I will have done my best. Which way are they? Yes, I know--they are over there, and if I walk all night and all day to-morrow I will surely come to them by to-morrow night. Only twenty-four hours more, and I believe I can hold out that long." So the poor lad started, and walked with uncertain steps through the yielding sands in a direction that he believed would lead him to the wished-for mountains. He could no longer see them, but he knew their slender pinnacles were steadfastly uplifted like taper fingers beckoning to him and promising pleasant things.