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Rh on the contrary, might prove a means of conciliation, by giving her father time to cool his anger, in the bright morning air. Cheered by this hope, her native graciousness of manner returned to her, and she received the heaped up basket with mirthful thanks.

"Good-morning now, Miss Newcome," Allen had replied; "perhaps your father may invite me home with him, to help eat them."

"I hope he may," was the fervent rejoinder; the echo of which answer rung in Allen's ears, and lit, also, a half-conscious blush on the cheek of the fair child herself, as she remembered her father's taunts of the previous evening, and feared she had been too forward in conversing with these strangers.

In a somewhat altered mood, the young men proceeded on their morning walk, and arrived at the disputed boundary in time to find their stakes already removed, and new ones placed where they cut off a valuable portion of their claim. This alteration prevented their prairie and timber land from joining, as it did before, and spoiled the shapeliness of the claim. The first impulse of either was a disposition to fight it out by force, if necessary-for they had the claim-laws on their side-but, upon remembering their promise to the timid child they had just parted from, a better resolution replaced the promptings of passion.

"All we can do in the premises," said Allen, "is to pull up these stakes, as Newcome has done, and put them back in their former places."

"Agreed," answered the Doctor. "I don't see any other way."

For half an hour the young men worked uninterruptedly; but, coming to the border of the timber, they then perceived Newcome, leaning against a tree, and carefully watching their proceedings. Resolving to take no notice of him unless first addressed, they continued pulling up and laying the stakes opposite the spot where he, stood.

"You'll find your labor lost, gentlemen," he remarked, grinning maliciously.

"Very well; we can repeat this game as often as you can," was the Doctor's impulsive reply.

"You may repeat it once too often!" retorted the Englishman.

"Do you threaten me?" asked the Doctor, angrily.

"Remember our promise, Doc," muttered Allen, so as not to be heard by the other. "Let the obstinate dog go: he may do you some mischief."

"If I don't threaten I may execute," said Newcome, with an ugly sneer.

Allen now saw that this war of words was likely to continue to an unprofitable length, and desiring to cover the Doctor's irritation, he hastened to put in a reply before his friend could do so.

"We don't think, Mr. Newcome, that you will do any thing violent or unlawful. If we can not settle this difficulty between our-