Crusoe in the bright blue lake.  Now he was in his mother’s cottage, telling her how he had thought of her when far away on the prairie, and what a bright, sweet word it was she had whispered in his ear—­so unexpectedly, too.  Anon he was scouring over the plains on horseback, with the savages at his heels; and at such times Dick would spring with almost supernatural strength from the ground, and run madly over the burning plain; but, as if by a species of fascination, he always returned to the salt river, and sank exhausted by its side, or plunged helplessly into its waters.

These sudden immersions usually restored him for a short time to reason, and he would crawl up the bank and gnaw a morsel of the maple sugar; but he could not eat much, for it was in a tough, compact cake, which his jaws had not power to break.  All that day and the next night he lay on the banks of the salt stream, or rushed wildly over the plain.  It was about noon of the second day after his attack that he crept slowly out of the water, into which he had plunged a few seconds before.  His mind was restored, but he felt an indescribable sensation of weakness, that seemed to him to be the approach of death.  Creeping towards the place where his rifle lay, he fell exhausted beside it, and laid his cheek on the Bible, which had fallen out of his pocket there.

While his eyes were closed in a dreamy sort of half-waking slumber, he felt the rough, hairy coat of an animal brush against his forehead.  The idea of being torn to pieces by wolves flashed instantly across his mind, and with a shriek of terror he sprang up—­to be almost overwhelmed by the caresses of his faithful dog.

Yes, there he was, bounding round his master, barking and whining, and giving vent to every possible expression of canine joy!

CHAPTER XIV.

Crusoe’s return, and his private adventures among the Indians—­Dick at a very low ebb—­Crusoe saves him.

The means by which Crusoe managed to escape from his two-legged captors, and rejoin his master, require separate and special notice.

In the struggle with the fallen horse and Indian, which Dick had seen begun but not concluded, he was almost crushed to death; and the instant the Indian gained his feet, he sent an arrow at his head with savage violence.  Crusoe, however, had been so well used to dodging the blunt-headed arrows that were wont to be shot at him by the boys of the Mustang Valley, that he was quite prepared, and eluded the shaft by an active bound.  Moreover, he uttered one of his own peculiar roars, flew at the Indian’s throat, and dragged him down.  At the same moment the other Indians came up, and one of them turned aside to the rescue.  This man happened to have an old gun, of the cheap sort at that time exchanged for peltries by the fur-traders.  With the butt of this he struck Crusoe a blow on the head that sent him sprawling on the grass.