Paul, all his pride aroused, made a great effort and stood straight again.

Slowly the world about him swam back, into its proper position.
"Who said I wasn't standing up ?" he asked.
"Nobody," replied Shif'less Sol; "but if I'd been through what I reckon you've been through, I'd fall flop on the ground, an' Jim Hart would have to come an' feed me or I'd starve to death right before his eyes." Paul laughed, and then he felt more like himself.

Ross, too, had been regarding him with sympathy, but he glanced inquiringly at Henry.
"You've had it hot an' hard ?" he said.
"Yes," replied the boy laconically; "we've run against Shawnees, and about everything that could has happened to us." "Then it's fire, warmth, meat, rest, an' sleep for Paul right away," said Ross.
Henry nodded.
Paul was looking at the fire, which seemed to him the most glorious one ever built, and he did not notice anything more until he was lying beside it, stretched on a blanket, and eating the very piece of tender buffalo meat that Shif'less Sol had coveted for himself.

Despite his relaxed and half-dreamy condition, his imagination leaped up at once to magnificent heights.

All danger and hardship were gone.