He took twenty rubles from his purse and holding the gold out to the soldier, pointed to the revolver. The soldier looked covetously at the money, but the officer shook his head, and taking the revolver from Raymond he showed some letters cut in the barrel, which evidently marked it as belonging to the Government. “They wouldn’t dare to sell government property,” said Sidney, “and anyway we can’t spare money to buy guns.” “I suppose we can’t, but I’m thinking we may wish we had some before we get through the mountains.” Raymond turned around to his horse, which he had left standing when he dismounted to give his exhibition of shooting, and was surprised to find that one of the soldiers had the animal in charge and had led him over to the bunch. “Well, they’ve got my horse, all right. I guess you’ll have to turn yours over too, Sid.” “I suppose so, but it’s certainly a shame.” Sidney dismounted and left his horse with the soldier, who still retained hold of the bridle. The officer gave an order and two of the men untied the rolls of blankets and cloaks from back of the saddles and laid them on the ground. They then emptied the saddlebags and placed the contents with the blankets, but did not remove the bags themselves. The officer then made out and signed a paper which he gave to Sidney, and which the boys assumed was a receipt for the horses. “You want to take good care of that paper, Sid,” said Raymond; “it will be a fine souvenir of the trip, and I expect that’s about all it will be good for.” When that was done the soldiers sprang into their saddles, rounded up all of the loose horses, including the two which had so recently belonged to the boys, and galloped off, the officer giving a courteous salutation to the boys as they departed. Sidney and Raymond stood in the road and looked after their vanishing steeds, then at the rolls of blankets which lay on the ground near them. For a few minutes neither spoke, then Raymond said,--“We’re stranded all right this time, Sid. This beats Lower California.” “It certainly does, and look at that range we’ve got to cross.” And Sidney gazed doubtfully at the far Caucasus, whose northern heights were white even at that distance. “I move we go back to Nizhni-Novgorod,” said Raymond, “and wait for father.” “I don’t believe it would be wise to try that,” replied Sidney. “By the time we reached the Volga probably all of the boats would be taken over by the Government to carry troops; you remember the captain said that Russia would mobilize more than five million men. We might not even be able to reach Astrakhan. It seems to me the quicker we get into the mountains the better, for I imagine they will take soldiers out of those mountains only as a last resort.” “Well, it’s going to be dark pretty soon, and we’d better hustle for this town ahead; what’s its name?--Timmy Can Show you.” Sidney laughed, “I’m sure I hope Timmy can show us, for we may, like the Missourian, need to be shown.”