Page:Cornelia Meigs-The Pirate of Jasper Peak.djvu/133

 wanted to do and asked to double the size of my claim.”

“They should have given you the whole valley,” Hugh said.

“They didn’t,” his friend replied drily. “They didn’t take any stock in me at all. I think they thought I was trying to dodge military service  for they sent over to the recruiting office to see if  the facts I gave agreed at both places. An officer came over himself to say, ‘If there is anything for that shouting madman to spend his energies on, in the name of Heaven, give it to him.’ So they  let me register for as much as I wanted and told  me to go back and hold it if I could. They were pretty sure I couldn’t.”

“But you will, oh, Oscar, I know you will,” Hugh said. “And now I see why you have called it the Promised Land.”

Oscar laughed a little shamefacedly.

“It is a foolish name perhaps and we will find another when the settlers come. But now I call it that just to—to keep my courage up. If you