The freshets which had washed the earth away from the roots, had piled a great mass of drift-wood against one side of them.

Sam made a careful examination of the place, and then all went to work.

The two boys so disposed some of the drift-wood as to make a sort of covered passage from the edge of the bank to the two trees whose roots were interlaced with each other.

Sam cut away some of the roots with his jackknife so as to make an entrance, and once inside the circle of outer roots, he was not long in making a roomy hiding-place for the whole party, immediately under the great trees.
[Illustration: JUDIE ON THE RAFT.] "We can enlarge our house with our knives whenever we choose," he said, "and if we stay here long enough, we must make Judie a room for herself under the other tree, with a passage leading from this into it." Sam said this to avoid saying something which would have alarmed and distressed the others.

In truth he knew himself to be really ill, and believed that he would be much worse before being any better.