was busy in and out of the room as he cleared away the supper and set the place in order.
"Well! what do you know about that!" exclaimed Jack Darrow, always ready with a comment upon any subject. "Dr. Todd is certainly some in earnest; isn't he?" "But what a cheek he has to ask you to go on such a journey!" cried Mark. "He talks as though he expected you to start immediately for the Arctic Circle."
"There would be good hunting up there in the mountains," said Andy
Sudds, succinctly. "I wouldn't mind that."
"An'disher chrysomela-bypunktater plant he wants," grunted Washington. "Hi, yi! ain't dat de beatenest thing? Who ebber heard of sech a plant befo'?"
"Nobody but you, I guess, Washington," said the professor, quietly. "That seems to be a plant of your own invention."
"But, sir!" cried Mark, "you have no idea of taking this trip he suggests; have you?"
"Dr. Todd has done me many a favor in the past," said Professor
Henderson, thoughtfully.
"Well, if you're going, count me in," said Jack, quickly. "I don't mind a summer trip to the Arctic. Say! it can't be much cooler up there than it is here right now. This fire doesn't feel bad at all."
"Humph!" muttered Mark, who never was as sanguine as his chum. "This cool spell will only last a day or two here; but I understand the tops of the Endicott Range are always white."
"B-r-r!" shivered Washington, at this statement. "Dis chile don't t'ink much ob such a surreptitious pedestrianation as dat, den. Don't like no cold wedder, nohow! And Buttsy don' like it, needer."
"Who's Buttsy?" demanded Jack, grinning.
"Why, fo' suah," said the darkey, gravely, "you knows Christopher
Columbus Amerigo Vespucci George Washington Abraham Lin——"
"But you wouldn't expect to take Christopher Columbus And-so-forth to
Alaska with us; would you?" asked Andy Suggs.
"Why not?" demanded the darkey. "He flowed to de moon in de perjectilator; didn't he? Huh! In co'se if de perfessor goes after disher chrysomela-bypunktater, I gotter go, too; and in co'se if I go, Buttsy done gotter go. Dat's as plain as de nose on yo' face, Andy."
The hunter rubbed his rather prominent nasal organ and was silenced. Jack and Mark had turned more eagerly to the professor as the latter began to speak:
"Yes, Dr. Todd is my good friend. He turns to me for help quite properly; who else should he turn to?"
"But, Professor!" ejaculated Mark, warmly. "Are you to be driven off to Alaska at your age to hunt for this herb—which is perhaps only the hallucination of a madman?" "Mark's hit the nail on the head, Professor!" declared Jack. "I believe this Todd must certainly be 'touched' in his upper story."
"Am I touched, as you call it, Jack?" demanded Professor Henderson, in some indignation.
"But you don't believe Todd is on the trail of any great discovery?" cried Mark.
"Why not? Mind may yield to herbal treatment. Todd is an advanced botanical adherent. He believes almost anything can be accomplished by herbs. And he says he has successfully treated one case."
"One swallow doesn't make a summer," remarked Mark, doubtfully.
"But it is enough that he wants us to find the herb," said the professor, more vigorously.
"'Us'!" repeated Jack.
"And he will pay us any reasonable price for our work," added their mentor.
"He really means to go!" cried Mark.
"I certainly do. I think you and Jack will accompany me," said the professor, quietly. "I know that Washington will, and of course Andy will not be left behind."
"Not if there'll be a chance at big game," declared the hunter. "I'm with you, Professor Henderson."
"Yo' suah can't git erlong widout me, I s'pose?" queried the darkey, in some uncertainty. "I'se mighty busy right yere jes' now."
"And you'll be busy if we go to Alaska, Wash!" cried Jack. "Hurrah!
I am willing to start to-morrow, Professor."
"And you, Mark?" queried the old gentleman of his other adopted son.
"How will we go, sir? We shall be until fall traveling to the Arctic
Circle by any usual means."
"True," said the professor. "And haste is imperative. I cannot spend much time in this matter. We must take unusual means of getting to the Endicott Range."
"What do you mean?" asked the boys in chorus.
"Your Snowbird is ready for flight. It can be provisioned and will take us all quicker than by any other means. Therefore in the Snowbird we will make the journey."
CHAPTER III
THE FLIGHT OF THE SNOWBIRD
Jack Darrow and Mark Sampson were glad enough to be of the party aiming to reach northern Alaska and the Endicott Range, if Professor Henderson really intended going to find the strange herb for which Dr. Todd was willing to pay so generously.
Of discussion, pro and con, there was much. Indeed, they sat up until after midnight after the reading of Dr. Todd's letter, talking over the contemplated journey, and gradually the details of the trip, including all preparations for it, were worked out.
Jack and Mark put into the affair, once they were determined to aid the professor, their characteristic energy. Professor Henderson wired his brother scientist that he would undertake the journey to Alaska, and accepted the ten thousand dollars to defray expenses. Andy Sudds made characteristic preparations for hunting the big game of the Alaskan mountains. Washington White built a traveling coop of very light but strong material for his pet Shanghai, and then announced himself as ready to depart for the Arctic Circle.
The instructions and map furnished by Dr. Todd, locating the very spot beyond the Endicott Range where the rare herb had been plucked by the miner, showed it to be in a very wild region indeed. There was a native settlement named Aleukan within a hundred miles of the valley where the herb was supposed to grow in abundance. Professor Henderson determined to lay their course for this place.
But the nearest white man's town was Coldfoot, on the other side of the mountains. There was a trail, however, passable in summer for a dogtrain from Coldfoot to Aleukan; and a dogtrain could likewise pass from the native village to the valley where the miner had found the herb.
These facts the professor and his young associates discovered as soon as Dr. Todd's instructions arrived. They made their plans accordingly.
By telegraph the professor ordered a trainload of supplies to be started at once from Fort Yukon. First, these supplies would go by boat down the Yukon Flats and up the Chandler River, past Chandler and Caro, beyond which latter town there was a good road over a small range of hills to Coldfoot. This trail was open at all seasons and there was a regular system of transportation into Coldfoot.
From that town dogs and men would be hired to take the supplies on to Aleukan. These arrangements were made through an express company, and in three days the professor received word that the supplies were already aboard a small steam vessel which had left the Fort Yukon dock for the trip to Caro.
The trip by boat and overland for the supply train would consume about a week or two, providing nothing untoward happened to delay it. And the season was favorable to a quick journey.
But the professor and his young comrades figured that the Snowbird, following the shortest air-line to