At length he flung down the pick, and stood panting. “Deed, thin, an I’m glad to see you back, so I am,” said Pat. “Glad!” said Bart. “Yis, glad I am; that same’s what I mane. I’d rather have you fail down here, than half way up. You niver cud go all the way; an if you had to turrun back when half way up, it’s a sore head I’d have watchin you; an you cud niver expict to git back here again without broken bones.” “If we only had one other pickaxe,” said Bart, “I could do it.” “Of coorse you cud; an if we had dizens of other things, you cud do it, so you cud, an so cud I; but there’s the throuble, an that’s what we’ve got to contind against, so it is.” “We’ll have to do something,” said Bart, gloomily and desperately. “Sure an that’s thrue for you, so it is, an you niver spoke a thruer word in yer life, so you didn’t,” said Pat; “an be the same token, it’s with this pick, so it is, that we’ve got to work,--for it’s the only thing we’ve got at all at all.” “What can we do,” said Bart, in the same gloomy tone, “if we can’t climb?” “Sure an there’s lots more, so there is,” said Pat, who on this occasion showed a wonderful fertility of invention. “I’ve ben a thinkin,” he added, “that we might dig away these logs with the pick.” “What good would that do?” asked Bart. “Sure an we might dig thim out one by one, an pile thim up as we dug thim, an so we might make a pile of logs high enough to reach to the top.” Bart was silent for a few moments. The suggestion was certainly of some value. “I wonder whether we mightn’t shake that log down on us, by pounding away down here?” “Sure an it’s the only thing,” said Pat. “We’ve got to run some risk, of coorse; an I don’t think that our blows would be felt so high up. Besides, we needn’t sthrike very hard.” “Well,” said Bart, “it’s the only thing we can do.” Upon this, Pat inserted the point of the pick between the logs near him, and tried to pry the lower one out at one end. But the stubborn log resisted his efforts. It had been too firmly fixed in its place to yield to such a slight force as that which he could bring. Bart lent his efforts, and the two exerted themselves with their utmost strength, but altogether in vain. “If we cud ony git out one log,” said Pat, “it wud be aisy workin out the others, so it wud; but this one seems a tough customer, so it does.” “There ought to be some log about here,” said Bart, “weaker than others.” “Sure an that’s thrue for you,” said Pat, “an so we’ll jist thry thim all one afther another, ivery one of them. We’ve got lots of time, so we have.” “See, here’s a smaller one,” said Bart. Pat struck the point of the pick where Bart pointed, and once more the two boys exerted themselves to pry out the log. But though this one was somewhat smaller than the other, it was quite as firmly fixed, and the utmost efforts of both of them failed to move it, even in the slightest degree, from its bed.