"There has been no chance to send you any since," replied Al. "And I got your last letter, dated June 20, at Fort Rice on my way down from the Yellowstone. So we shall all have much to tell each other. Although I didn't succeed in rescuing Tommy in the way I hoped to do," he put his arm affectionately over his small brother's shoulders, "I believe this trip of mine has been good for me, and will be in the future for all of us." And so, indeed, it proved, for the following year Al readily secured an appointment to West Point through the hearty endorsements of General Sully and other army officers whom he had come to know in the Northwest; and the father of Wallace Smith, after the close of the war had brought prosperity and new floods of settlers to the Minnesota frontier, was able to help Mrs. Briscoe to such a profitable sale of her desirable claim near Fort Ridgely that she had enough to live upon comfortably at her sister's hospitable home in St. Louis, while Tommy and Annie were completing their education in the excellent schools of that city, and sometimes spending a vacation in cruising up and down the Mississippi on Captain Lamont's fine steamer. Thus Al's unselfish enterprise on behalf of his brother, begun under such discouraging circumstances, resulted, directly or indirectly, in advancing the interests and happiness of himself and all those dearest to him; and he never had cause for anything but gratitude and rejoicing over the friends made and the experiences gained during his adventurous Summer with Sully in the Sioux land. THE END End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of With Sully into the Sioux Land, by Joseph Mills Hanson