Trailey replied that the landlord turned teetotaler right on the spot, and threw the brandy away; which Sam, as an ex-barman, observed "was a wilful prevershun of the trufe, besides bein' a dam' silly thing ter do." The lecturer now became still more discursive. He explained that the money spent in England in one year on intoxicating liquors would pay off half the national debt, build twenty-seven modern battleships carrying 12-in. guns, equip and maintain a home for fallen women at Okhotsk, and even then leave sufficient money over with which to erect and endow a tin-roofed temperance tabernacle at Timbuktu. "By Jove!" cried Bert, to whom the news was a complete revelation. "Just imagine what could be done if we spent twice as much!" "Not 'arf," said Sam, who was temporarily paralyzed by the astounding information. "Or three times as much," added Bert, as his keen legal brain instantly grasped the significance of the statement. As for Trailey himself, he had never paid for a drink in his life, so naturally he registered considerably less awe for his own statistics than did the others. Quite soon, being congenitally drowsy, he fell back on Sam's bed and lapsed into peaceful slumber. Upon being prodded awake again, he asked Sam as a very special favour to take him home, a request the little Cockney, with his usual good-nature, readily granted. Hastily jumping into a few clothes, Sam dexterously steered Trailey through the torn tent opening. They stood outside for a little while, ostensibly to admire the effulgent beauty of the matchless prairie night, but actually to permit Trailey to instruct the man in charge of the roundabout to stop the giddy thing at once. This the stupid fellow refused to do; so, tacking along in weird, zig-zaggy spurts, stumbling over pegs and ropes, the pair made their tortuous way to Trailey's own tent, which was a matter of only thirty or forty yards distant. Sam noiselessly opened the flap and then began gently to push his lurching companion into the opening. "Ah-h," sighed Trailey wearily, "so here we are at last, eh?" Responding to a sudden mood, he turned and faced Sam. Swaying gently back and forth in the light wind which still went whispering among the tents, he surveyed his little guide in quite a fatherly and tender manner. "Sham, me bhoy," he said, "'tever you do, keep away from--hic--the curs-ed drink. It's Satan 'imself. Goo'-night," then, turning round, he toppled through the tent-door, which Sam, with his habitual good sense, was at great pains to refasten. CHAPTER VII _Saskatoon--Martha Trailey_