My attention was now called to a peculiarity in the road. We had ascended gradually, till we were crossing bare rock at a suspicious angle, and still the way grew steep. Thinking I must have missed the path, and that a track I saw a few moments before might be the true one, I stopped the cattle and hastened to examine it, with a frequent "whoa!" The result showed that we were on the right road. Returning, I found that the cattle, with a quick movement, had gained the apex of the bill, and there they stood, ranged along the verge of a precipice of at least one hundred and fifty feet! The slightest false movement might send them over. As carefully as possible, I turned them down to the road again,—and they were models of docility the while,—but the instant it was done, they wheeled about, throwing the vehicle completely over, and steamed toward home, leaving the wagon-body on the side of the rock, and further down the hind wheels; and recrossing the river, they sped up the other declivity, while I shouted most despairingly after them. By taking a bee line, however, I succeeded in coming out in front of them before they emerged upon the smooth prairie. Then, there was the righting of the front wheels, the attaching of the others, the guiding of the perverse animals up the bluff to the ponderous wagon-body. Where "should" I get help to replace it, in that lonely place, seldom trodden by human foot? I felt that this was an extremity, and for a moment could do nothing but pray. Then I looked up the winding path I had come, hoping to see some friendly face. None appeared. Meanwhile the cattle were restless. So, summoning all my energy,—the energy of desperation,—to my own wonder, I raised the huge wreck from its resting-place and adjusted it to the wheels, and in due time reached the mill village. "Have you any lumber?" I asked of the mill owner. "No; I let the last go this morning," he replied. "A man was here from L—, and said he must have some for his own house and some for his minister's. I let him have a few boards to keep him from suffering, though I needed them myself. Perhaps you are the minister from L—? Well, I thought likely. But I haven't a chip left. Which way did you come?" "Across R— River, through the woods." "No wonder you've been cast-away; it's a terrible road. Let me advise you to take the other route going back; it will be prairie mostly, and though further, will be easier." "I shall do so. But what is that?" I asked, as my eyes rested on the end of a board protruding from a mass of timber. "Well, that 'does' look like a board," said the easy proprietor, "but it would be a job to get it out." And he turned away, while I turned over the oak timber till I had obtained more of a supply than the neighbor that preceded me. "Six miles to the Norwegian," said the mill man, as I was starting off. "You had better inquire the way of him, as the road is a blind one, and he knows all about it."