"Sleep lost once is lost forever." "Obed has got some sense if he don't look like it," chuckled the Ring Tailed Panther.

"Here's to followin' his advice." Ned took it, too, and slept until the afternoon, when a messenger asked him to come to Mr.Austin's tent, a large one, with the sides now open.
Obed was invited to come with him, and, as Ned stood in the door of the tent the mild, grave man advanced eagerly, a glow of pleasure and affection on his face.
"My boy! my boy!" he said, putting both hands on Ned's shoulders.

"I was sure that I should never see you again, after you made your wonderful escape from our prison in Mexico.

But you are here in Texas none the worse, and they tell me you have passed through a very Odyssey of hardship and danger." Water stood in Ned's eyes.

He rejoiced in the affection and esteem of this man, and yet Mr.Austin was very unlike the rest of the Texans.
They were rough riders; men of the plains always ready to fight, but he, cultivated and scholarly, was for peace and soft words.