Then he was happy. For the first time in his life he was free and unfettered, having cut himself off forever, as he thought, from the heavy trammels of civilisation. Oliver had at once begun his apprenticeship as a hunter, and a rude apprenticeship it is, causing many of the boldest and bravest to retreat. But Oliver was no ordinary man; he was young, of rare vigour and address, and, above all, possessed that iron will which nothing stops, and which is the secret of great deeds; that leonine courage which laughs at danger, and that indomitable pride which made him, he thought, the equal of any living being. He therefore considered nothing impossible, that is to say, he felt he could not only do what anyone else had ever done, but even more, if he were called upon by extraordinary circumstances to try. During two months he had met with numerous adventures. He had fought many a battle, and braved dangers before which the bravest might have retreated--perils of all kinds, from man, beast, and Nature herself. A victor in every case, his audacity had increased, his energy had redoubled. His apprentice days were over, and he now felt himself a true runner of the woods, that is to say, a man whom no appalling sight, whom no dreadful catastrophe, would terrify--in fact, one who was only to be moved by the majestic aspect of nature. He had paused as he left the thicket to examine the scene. Before him was a valley through which flowed two rivers, which after some time joined and fell into the Missouri, whose vast lake surface appeared like a white vapoury line on the distant horizon. Upon a promontory projecting into the first river was a superb bosquet of palms and magnolias; the latter, shaped like a perfect cone, stood in lustrous verdure against the dazzling whiteness of the flowers, which, despite the season, were still blooming. These flowers were so large that Oliver could see them a mile off. The great majority of these magnolias were over a hundred feet high; many were very much more. To the right was a wood of poplars, overrun with vines of enormous size, which wholly concealed the trunks. They then ran to the top of the tree, then redescending along the branches, passed from one tree to another, mixing up with piquot, a kind of creeper which hung in garlands and festoons from every bough. The young man could not take his eyes off the magnificent spectacle. Suddenly he started, as he made out a thin column of smoke rising from the centre of the magnolia thicket. Now the presence of smoke denotes fire, and fire indicates human beings. In nine cases out of ten, in the desert, such human beings are enemies. It is a harsh word, but it is certain that the most cruel enemy of man in the desert, his most terrible adversary, is his fellow man.