Beyond reasonable doubt, our party is the only one that ever pushed its way by boat up the entire course of the farther-most Mississippi. Beyond any question, our canoes were the first wooden boats that ever traversed those waters. Schoolcraft, in 1832, came all the way down the upper river without portages, but he had very high water and many helpers, in spite of which one of his birch canoes was wrecked. The correspondent of a New York newspaper claimed the complete trip in his canoe some five years ago, but his own guide and others told us that his Dolly Varden never was above Brainerd, and that his portages above were frequent. So we may well feel an honest pride in our Rushton-built Rob Roys and our hard knocks, and may remember with pardonable gratification that upon our own feet and keels we have penetrated the solitudes lying around the source of the world's most remarkable river, where no men live and where, probably, not more than two-score white men have ever been.--A.H. SIEGFRIED. ADAM AND EVE. CHAPTER XXVI. By the time Reuben May entered the little town of Looe he had come to a decision about his movements and how he should carry out his plan of getting back to London. Not by going with Captain Triggs, for the monotonous inaction of a sailing voyage would now be insupportable to him, but by walking as far as he could, and now and then, whenever it was possible, endeavoring to get a cheap lift on the road. His first step must therefore be to inform Triggs of his decision, and to do this he must get back to Plymouth, a distance from Looe of some fifteen or sixteen miles. In going through Looe that morning he had stopped for a few minutes at a small inn which stood not far from the beach; and having now crossed the river which divides West from East Looe, he began looking about for this house, intending to get some refreshments, to rest for an hour or so, and then proceed on his journey. Already the town-clock was striking six, and Reuben calculated that if he started between nine and ten he should have time to take another good rest on the road--which he had already once that day traversed--and reach Plymouth Barbican, where the Mary Jane lay, by daybreak. The inn found, he ordered his meal and informed the landlady of his intention. "Why, do 'ee stop here till mornin', then," exclaimed the large-hearted Cornish woman. "If 'tis the matter o' the money," she added, eying him critically, "that's hinderin' 'ee from it, it needn't to, for I'll see us don't have no quarrel 'bout the price o' the bed." Reuben assured her that choice, not necessity, impelled his onward footsteps; and, thus satisfied, she bade him "Take and lie down on the settle there inside the bar-parlor; for," she added, "'less 'tis the sergeant over fra Liskeard 'tain't likely you'll be disturbed no ways; and I shall be in and out to see you'm all right."