Page:Castlemon--Joe Wayring at Home.djvu/196

 do some damage to every hunting and fishing party that comes here."

"Well, what are we standing here for?" exclaimed Tom, who had expected before this time to hear somebody propose an immediate pursuit of the robber. "We might as well stay here and take it easy, as to get wild and rush around through the woods for nothing," replied Joe; and Tom was surprised to see how ready he was to give his boat up for lost. "In the first place, we couldn't overtake the robber, and in the second, we couldn't recover our property if we did. The day of reckoning will surely come, but we can't do any thing to hasten it."

The idea that the squatter would disturb any of the things in the other canoes had never entered into Tom's mind. Matt seemed to remember, with as much gratitude as such a man was capable of, that Tom was one of the few who sympathized with him when he was ordered out of Mount Airy, and yet he had made little distinction between his property and that belonging to the sons of the trustees who ordered him away. There was no sham