Dick shrugged his shoulders in comic despair. His speech was finally delivered from the perilous eminence of a booking-clerk's stool, an elevation which Jan so gravely mistrusted that he felt impelled to rise erect on his hind feet, placing both fore paws beside his lord's raised heels, and thereby providing the camera men with the most famous of all the snap-shots yet obtained. The speech, as literally recorded in shorthand by one of Regina's most promising young pressmen, if not a very finished or distinguished effort, was clearly a hardy and quick-growing production, since it did eventually develop into a long half-column in some newspapers, according to the unimaginative and literal stenographic record aforementioned. It was as follows: "It's very good of you fellows--er--Right you are, sir! er--ladies and gentlemen!--But, really, you know, I can't make a speech. It's no use. I--er--I'm tremendously obliged to you all. What you say is--er--well, the fact is I've only done what any other man in the service would have done. It's splendid to see you all again and--I _have_ brought back the Mounted Police Dog. Thank you!" And, according to the shorthand man, that was all. But a generous sub-editorial fraternity understood the speech differently; and newspaper readers doubtless came to the conclusion that oratory must now be added to the other accomplishments of the versatile R.N.W.M.P. There were no embarrassing calls for speeches at the barracks, but even there Dick (still closely attended by Jan, upon whom one of the impressions produced by his return to the complex conditions of civilization was an anxious fear that his sovereign lord would somehow be spirited away from him if he ever let Dick out of his sight) was called upon to face a raking fire of compliments from his commanding officer, delivered in the presence of a full muster of commissioned and non-commissioned ranks. "You have done your duty finely as a sergeant of the Royal North-west Mounted Police, and, for us who know what it means, I don't know that the ablest man in the country can hope to earn higher praise than that." Those were the chief's concluding words, and the full-throated, if somewhat hoarse, cheer which they elicited from the men assembled behind Dick and Jan, as well as from the group beside the chief, had the curious effect of filling Dick's eyes with moisture of a sort that pricked most painfully, so that as he came to the salute before retiring he saw the familiar buildings in front of him but dimly, as through a fog. XXXVIII THE FALL OF SOURDOUGH Just before darkness fell that evening Captain Arnutt called Dick from his quarters and asked him to go for a stroll. Together, and closely followed by Jan, they started. Before the barracks gate was reached they were met by Sergeant Moore, with Sourdough at his heels.