“Away! nor let me loiter in my song,
For we have many a mountain path to tread,
And many a varied shore to sail along,—
By truth and sadness, not by fiction, led.”
The day agreed on, by the trappers, for starting on their expedition into the unbroken wilds around and beyond the upper lakes to the extreme reservoirs of the lordly Androscoggin, had at length arrived. All the married men belonging to the company, not having sons of their own old enough, had engaged those of their neighbors to come and remain with their families during their absence from home, which, it was thought probable, would be prolonged to nearly December. Steel-traps and rifles had been put in order, ammunition plentifully provided, and supplies of such provisions as could not be generally procured by the rifle and fish-hook in the woods and its waters, carefully laid in; and all were packed up the night previous, and in readiness for a start the next morning.
It had been agreed that the company should rendezvous on the lake-shore, at the spot which we have already often mentioned, and which, by common consent, was now beginning to be called Elwood’s Landing. And, accordingly, early on the appointed morning, Mark Elwood and his son Claud, having dispatched their breakfast, which Mrs. Elwood had been careful to make an unusually good and plentiful one, shouldered their large hunting packs, with their blankets neatly folded and strapped outside; and, having bid that anxious and thoughtful wife and mother a tender farewell, left the house and proceeded with a lively step to the border of the lake. On reaching their canoe at the landing, they glanced inquiringly around them for some indications of the presence or coming of their expected companions. But not a living object met their strained gaze, and not the semblance of a sound greeted their listening ears. A light sheeted fog, of varying thickness and density in the different portions of the wide expanse,—here thin and spray-like, as if formed of the breath of some marine monster, and there thickening to the appearance of the stratiform cloud,—lay low stretched, in long, slow-creeping undulations, over the bosom of the waveless lake.
“The first on the ground, after all,” exclaimed Mr. Elwood, on peering out sharply through the partially-obstructing fog in the direction of the outlet of the lake, up through which most of the company, who lived on the rivers below, were expected to come. “That is smart, after so much cautioning to us to be here in season. But they cannot be very far off, can they, Claud?”
“One would suppose not,” replied the latter; “but sounds, in this dense and quiet state of the atmosphere, could be distinguished at a great distance, and, with all that my best faculties can do, I cannot hear a single sound from any quarter.—But stay, what was that?”
“What did you think you heard, Claud?” asked Mr. Elwood, after waiting a moment for the other to proceed or explain.
“Why, I can hardly tell, myself,” was the musing reply; “but it was some shrill, long-drawn sound, that seemed to come from a great distance in the woods off here to the southeast, or on the lake beyond.”
“Perhaps it was a loon somewhere up the lake,” suggested Mr. Elwood.
“It may be so, possibly,” rejoined Claud, doubtfully; “but, if there were any inhabitants near enough in that direction, I should think it must be—hark, there it is again! and, as I thought, the crowing of a rooster.”
“A rooster! then it must be the echo of one, that has somehow struck across from Phillips’ barn; but how could that be? Ah, I have just thought: your rooster must be Codman coming down the lake. You know how curiously he imitated that creature at the logging bee, don’t you?”
“No; I happened to be in a noisy bustle in the house, just at the time of those queer performances of his, and heard them imperfectly. But, if the sound I heard was not that of a veritable rooster, I never was so deceived in my life respecting the character of a sound.”
“Well, I think you will find I am right, but we will wait, listen, and see.”
The event soon proved the truth of Mr. Elwood’s conjecture. Suddenly a canoe, rounding a woody point a half-mile to the right, shot into view, and the old loud and shrill Kuk-kuk-ke-o-ho of Comical Codman rang far and wide over the waters to the echoing hills beyond. But, before Claud had sufficiently recovered from his surprise to respond to the triumphant “I told you so” of his father, the strange salute was answered by a merry, responsive shout of voices in the opposite direction; and presently two canoes, each containing two men, emerged into view from the fog hanging over the outlet, and, joining in a contest of speed, to which they seemed to perceive the single boatman was, by his movements, challenging them, rapidly made their way towards the understood goal of the landing.
“The race is run,
The vict’ry won!”
exclaimed the trapper, in his usual cheery tone and inimitable air of mock gravity, as he drew up his oar, to let the impulse of his last stroke send his canoe in to the shore of the landing, as it did, while the foremost of his competitors in the friendly race was yet fifty yards distant. “Mighty smart fellows, you!” he resumed, waggishly cocking his eye towards the hunter, who had charge of the boat most in advance. “What bright and early chaps, living only from two to five miles off, to let one who has ten miles to come be in first at the rendezvous!”
“Well, Codman, I suppose we must give in,” responded the hunter. “But, to do all this, you must have risen long before day; how did you contrive to wake up?”
“Why, crowed like the house a-fire, and waked myself up, to be sure!” replied Codman, promptly. “How did you suppose I did it? But let that all go; I want to look you over a little. You have brought some new faces with you, this time, haven’t you, Mr. Hunter?”
“Yes, here is one,” answered Phillips, pointing to a tall, sandy-complexioned, but good-looking man of about thirty, who, having occupied the forward seat of the canoe, now quietly stepped ashore; “yes, gentlemen,” added the hunter, addressing himself to the Elwoods, standing on the bank, as well as to the trapper, “I make you acquainted with Mr. Carvil,—a man, if I ain’t a good deal out in my reckoning, who might be relied on in most any circumstances.”
The customary salutations were then exchanged with the stranger; when the hunter, instinctively understanding that often violated rule of true politeness which requires of the introducer some accompanying remark, giving a clue to the position and character of the introduced, so as to gratify the natural curiosity felt on such occasions, and to impart more freedom to the conversation, quickly resumed:
“Mr. Carvil is a Green Mountain boy, who loves hunting, partly for the health it gives, and partly for the fun of it. His old range has usually been round the Great Megantic, the other side of the highlands, in Canada, where I have heard of him through the St. Francis Indians. But, having a mind to see and try this side, he came on a few days ago, inquired me out, and turned in with me. We from below have invited him to join our company; are you all here agreed to that?”
“Certainly,” said Mark Elwood, in his usual off-hand manner.
“Certainly,” added Claud, more specifically, “I think we ought to be gratified in such an acquisition to our company.”
“And you, Codman?” said the hunter, turning inquiringly to the trapper. “It is your turn to speak. But don’t show the gentleman so many of your bad streaks, to begin with, as to put him out of conceit of you before he has time to find out your good ones.”
“Well, I don’t see but I must run the risk, then,” said the trapper; “my streaks always come out as they come up, I never pick any of them out as samples for strangers. But to the question,—well, let’s run him over once, if he won’t be mad: high cheek bones, showing him enough of the Indian make to be a good hunter; a crank, steady eye, indicating honest motives, and a good resolution, that won’t allow a man to rest easy till his object is carried out; and lastly, a well-put-together, wiry frame, to bear fatigues, and do the work which so large a head must often lay out for it. Yes, he passes muster with me bravely: let him in, with a welcome.”
Carvil rewarded these good-natured running commentaries on his person and supposed qualities, with a complacent bow; when the trapper turned to the other canoe, which, with Gaut Gurley and the young Indian described in a preceding chapter on board, now came within speaking distance, and sang out:
“Hil-lo! there, you, captain, who made the big logs fly so like the de-i-vel, the other day, whether the old chap had any hand in it or not, what red genius is that you have brought along with you?”
“It’s Tomah, the young red man from the Connecticut-river region, who hunted some in this section last fall, I understand. I supposed you had met him before,” replied Gaut.
“O, ah, well, yes,” responded Codman; “I bethink me, now, it is the young Indian that went to college, but couldn’t be kept there long enough to make any thing else, though long enough, may be, to spoil him for a hunter.”
“May be not, too,” retorted Tomah, with a miffed air, which showed he did not so readily appreciate the half-serious, half-sportive manner of the trapper as the other stranger had done. “May be, when you out with me catching beaver, one, two month, you no crow so loud.”
“That’s right,” interposed the hunter; “the Indian gives you what you deserve for your nonsense, Codman. But a truce to jokes. Let us all aboard, strike out, and be on our way over the lake.”
In compliance with this suggestion, those not already in the boats took to their seats, handled their oars, pushed off, and, headed by the hunter and his boat companion, and falling, one after another, into a line, rowed steadily on across the broadest part of the lake, taking a lofty pine, whose attenuated top looked like a reed rising over the fog in the distance, as a guide and landmark to the great inlet, where the most arduous task of their expedition was to be encountered,—the surmounting of the long line of rapids leading to the great lakes above. But that task, after a pleasant rowing of a couple of hours had brought them to it, was, by dint of hard struggles against the current, with oars as long as oars could be made to prevail; with setting-poles when oars ceased to serve the purpose; and with ropes attached to the boats and drawn from point to point or rock to rock, when neither oars nor poles were of any avail; together with the carrying both boats and baggage by land round the last and most difficult ascent,—that task was at length accomplished, and, before one o’clock in the afternoon, all the boats, with their loading, were safely launched on the broad bosom of the wild and picturesque Molechunk-a-munk.
Here, however, the company decided on taking their midday’s lunch, and an hour’s rest, before proceeding on their voyage. But, not deeming it expedient to incur the trouble and delay which the building of fires and the new cooking of provisions would require, they drew out only their bread and cold meats, for the occasion; and these, as the company were seated in an irregular circle on the rocks, were discussed and dispatched with that keen relish which abstinence and a toil-earned appetite alone could have brought them.
After they had finished their repast, they, at the suggestion of Phillips and Codman, the only persons of the company who were familiar with the lakes and country above, took up a question which they had before discussed, without settling, but which, they were told by the persons just named, must now, before proceeding any farther, be definitely settled and understood. This question was that of the expediency of establishing a general head-quarters for the season, by building a large, storm-proof camp, and locating it at some central point on the shore of one of the two great lakes opening still above the one on which they were now about to embark. The object of this was to insure the company comfortable quarters, to which they could resort in case of falling sick, or encountering long storms, at which their furs could be collected and more safely kept, their more cumbrous stores left, and from which their provisions could be distributed, with the least trouble and travel, to the smaller and more temporary camps that each of the company, or any two of them, might make at the nearest terminations, on the neighboring waters, of the different ranges of woods they should select for their respective fields of operations. The main part of the question, that of the necessity of establishing general head-quarters, was at once, and unanimously, decided in the affirmative. The remaining part, that of the most eligible location for these quarters, was then fully discussed, and finally settled by fixing the point of location about midway of the eastern side of the Mooseeluk-maguntic, the next great lake above, and, counting from the south, the third in this unique chain of secluded lakes and widely clustering lakelets, through which the far-spanning Androscoggin pours its vast volume of wild waters to the distant bosom of the welcoming ocean.
“Wisely arranged,” remarked the hunter, at the close of the discussion. “The next object in view, then, is to reach there this evening, in season to work up something in the shape of a camp, that will serve for the night, and until the good one we propose to build can be completed.”
“That can be done easily enough,” said Codman, “that is, if we will tax our marrow-bones a little extra in pulling at the oars. The distance over this lake, up the narrows, or river, and across the end of the Maguntic to the mouth of that second stream we have talked of, can’t be much more than a dozen miles, and all smooth sailing. Lord, yes! if we put in like decent oarsmen, I warrant we make fetch come, so as to be there by the sun an hour high, which will give time to build a comfortable camp, and for cooking up the jolly good supper I’m thinking to have, to pay us far all these sweats and hard pulls up these confounded rapids and over these never-ending lakes.”
“Well, let us put in, then, boys,” responded Gaut Gurley. “I am as much for the go-ahead principle as the best of you. Let us try the motion, and earn the good supper, whether we get it or not. But, to make the supper quite the thing for the occasion, it strikes me we ought to have something a little fresher than our salt junk.”
“True, O King, and Great Mogul of the lubber-lifts,” rejoined the trapper; “thou talkest like one not altogether without knowledge of the good living of the woods. That something fresher we will have, if it be only a mess of fish, which I think I can take out of that stream in a short time after we get there.”
“That could be done as we go along, if these lakes are as well stocked with large trout as they are reputed,” observed Carvil, in the calm, deliberate manner which characterized him on all occasions.
“But we mustn’t stop for that,” said the trapper.
“There is no need of stopping,” quietly replied the former.
“That’s a queer idea,” said the trapper, evidently at fault. “How are we to put in and wait for bites, without stopping, I would like to know?”
“Perhaps I may be able to demonstrate the matter, as we proceed on our way. At all events, since the question is raised, I will try,” replied Carvil, drawing from his pocket a roll of small silk cord, to which a fish-hook, without any sinker, was attached. “Can any of you handily get at your pork, so as to cut off and throw me a small bit? There, that will do,” he continued, taking the proffered bit of meat, and baiting his hook with it. “Now, the experiment I propose to try is what in my region we call ‘troulling,’ which consists of throwing out a baited hook and paying out, as the boat moves on, a hundred feet, or so, of line, that is left to trail, floating on the surface of the water behind; when most large fish, like bass, or trout, especially if you make a sharp tack, occasionally, so as to draw the line across an undisturbed portion of the water, will see, and, darting up, seize it, and hook themselves. And, if you have many large trout here, and they are any related to those I have found in the Great Maguntic, and other large bodies of fresh water, they will some of them stand a pretty good chance to be found adding to our supper to-night.”
“Sorry to hear it,” said the trapper, “for I have always considered the trout a sensible fish, and I should be sorry to lose my respect for them. But, if they will do that, they are bigger fools than I took them to be. But you’ll find they just won’t.”
“Well, I don’t know about that, now. I am not so sure but there may be something in it,” remarked the hunter, who had been listening to Carvil with evident interest. “Though we have never tried that method in this region, to my knowledge, yet my experience rather goes to confirm the notion. I remember to have caught several fine trout, when I had laid down my pole, and was moving off with my boat, but had left my line trailing behind. Those great fellows are not very bashful about seizing any thing they think they can eat, which they can see on the surface. I have known them do a stranger thing than to come up and seize a piece of pork.”
“What was that?” asked the trapper.
“Well, I don’t know as you will believe the story,” answered the other, “but it will be equally true, if you don’t. Some years ago I was out on the Umbagog, for a mess of trout, but couldn’t get a bite; and, seeing a flock of black ducks in a neighboring cove, I hauled in my line, and rowed off towards them, thinking I might get a shot, and so have something to carry home, by way of mending my luck at fishing. But, before I got near enough to count with much certainty on the effect of a shot, if I fired, they all flew up, but one, which, though it seemed to be trying hard enough, could not raise its body out of the water. As my canoe drifted in nearer, I once or twice raised my rifle to fire at it; but it acted so strangely, flapping the water with its wings, and tugging away at swimming, without appearing to gain scarce a single foot, that I soon laid down my piece and concluded I would try to take it alive, supposing it must have got fast tangled with something, but with what, I was wholly unable to conceive. So, taking up my oar, and gunning my canoe, so as to send it by within reach of the bird, I gave two or three strong pulls, threw down the oar, put out my hand, and sat ready for the grab, which the next moment I made, seizing the panting and now sinking duck by one of its outspread wings, and pulling it in, with a big trout fastened to its foot and leg so tight by the teeth that the hold did not give way till the greedy fish was brought slapping over the side, and landed safely in the bottom of the canoe. That trout, when I got home, weighed just seven pounds and nine ounces.”
“Wheugh! whiz! kak! ke-o-ho!” exclaimed, whistled, and crowed Comical Codman.
“I do not doubt it in the least,” said Carvil.
“Nor can I, of course, on Mr. Phillips’ statement,” added Mark Elwood; “but, if I had not known his scrupulousness in matters of fact, I should not have believed that so strange a circumstance had ever happened in the world.”
“So the story is voted gospel, is it?” rejoined the trapper. “Well, then, I propose we commission its author to cruise along the coves this afternoon, so that he may bring into camp to-night trout enough caught in that way to make up what Mr. Carvil may miss taking by his method, together with a brace or two of nice ducks, which would be a still further fine addition to our supper.”
“Yes, ducks or some other kind of flesh, to go with the fish, we may now safely count on being secured, by some of the various proposed methods,” here interposed Claud Elwood, seriously. “And I second the motion of such a cruise along the shores, by Mr. Phillips, who so seldom fails of killing something. And if he, Mr. Carvil, and father, will agree to an exchange of boat companions for the afternoon, I should like to go with him. I have chosen him my schoolmaster in hunting, and I should have a chance for another lesson before we go into the separate fields of our approaching operations.”
Gaut Gurley started at the suggestion, and cast a few quick, searching glances at Claud and the hunter, as if suspecting a concert of action between them, for some purpose affecting his secret plans; but, appearing to read nothing in either of their countenances to confirm such suspicions, and seeing all the rest of the company readily falling in with the proposal, he held his peace, and joined the others in handling the oars for their immediate departure; which was now in a few minutes taken, the main part of the company striking in a direct line across the middle of the lake for their destination, leaving the hunter and Claud moving off obliquely to the right, for a different and farther route among the intervening islands, and along the indented shores beyond,—where it will best comport with the objects of our story, we think, to accompany them in their solitary excursion.
“Where away, as the sailors have it?” said Claud, after the two, each with a single oar, had rowed on a while in silence; “where away, Mr. Phillips, or in the line of what object in sight would you lay your course?”
“Why, I had proposed, in my own mind,” replied the hunter, “to steer direct across, so as to graze the east side of the great island you see yonder in the distance; but, as we shall pass so near the cove which lies snuggled away between two sharp, woody points here, a little ahead to the right, we might as well, perhaps, haul in and take a squint round it.”
“What shall we find there?”
“Perhaps nothing. It is the place, however, where I found that deer which I killed when we were here before.”
“Well, if you can count on another, we should turn in there now.”
“We will; but a hunter, young man, must never talk of certainties when going to any particular spot in search of such roving things as the animals of the forest. He must learn to bear disappointment, and be prepared to find nothing where he or others had before found every thing. He must have patience. Loss of patience is very apt to be fatal to success in almost any business, but especially so in hunting. You spoke of taking lessons of me in the craft: this is the very first grand lesson I would impress on your mind. But we are now close upon the point of land, which we are only to round to be in the cove. If you are disposed to row the boat alone, now, keep in or out, stop or move on, as I from time to time give the word, I will be down on my knees in the bow of the boat, with cocked rifle in hand, ready for what may be seen.”
Readily complying, Claud carefully rowed round the point and entered the dark and deep indenture constituting the cove, whose few acres of surface were thrown almost wholly into the shade, even at sunny noonday, by the thickly-clustered groups of tall, princely pines, which, like giant warriors in council, stood nodding their green plumes around the closely-encircling shores. Closely hugging the banks, now stopping behind some projecting clump of bushes, now in some rock-formed nook, and now in the covert of some low-bending treetop, to give the keen-eyed hunter a chance to peer round or through these screening objects into the open spaces along the shore beyond, he slowly pushed along the canoe till the whole line of the cove was explored, and they reached the point corresponding to the one at which they commenced their lookout for game, and all without seeing a living creature.
“Pshaw! this is dull business,” exclaimed Claud, as they came out into the open lake, where he was left free to speak aloud. “This was so fine a looking place for game that I felt sure we should see something worth taking; and I am quite disappointed in the result.”
“So that, then, is the best fruit you can show of my first lesson in hunting, is it, young man?” responded the hunter, with a significant smile.
Claud felt the implied rebuke, and promised better behavior for the future; when both seated themselves at the oars, and, as men naturally do, after an interval of suppressed action, plied themselves with a vigor that sent their craft swiftly surging over the waters in the line of their original destination.
They now soon reached, and shot along the shore of, a beautifully-wooded island, nearly a half-mile in extent, about midway of which the hunter rested on his oars, and, after Claud, on his motion, had done the same, observed, pointing through a partial opening among the trees, along a visible path that led up a gentle slope into the interior of the island:
“There! do you catch a glimpse of a house-like looking structure, in an open and light spot in the woods, a little beyond where you cease to trace the path?”
“Yes, quite distinctly. What is it?”
“That belongs to the chief, and might properly enough be called his summer-house, as he generally comes here with his family to spend the hot months. He raises fine crops of corn in his clearing on there beyond the house, and saves it all, because the bears, coons, and squirrels, that trouble him elsewhere, are so completely fenced out by the surrounding water.”
“Are the family there, now?”
“No; they have moved back to his principal residence, a mile or two distant, on a point of land over against the opposite side of this island, and not far out of our course.”
“Indeed! what say you, then, to giving them a call as we pass by?”
“We shall not have time, which is a good reason for not calling now, if there were not still stronger ones.”
“What stronger reasons, or what other reasons at all?”
“Well, perhaps there are none. But, supposing two of the company we left behind, who might happen to conceive they have some secret interest at stake, should ever suspect that your leading object in leaving them was to make the very visit you are now proposing, would you not prefer that we should have it in our power to set their minds at rest, when we join them to-night, by telling them all the places we did touch at?”
“It is possible I should, in such a case,” replied Claud, looking surprised and puzzled; “but, ‘suspected,’ did you say? Why should they suspect? and what if they do?”
“Three questions in a heap, when one is more than I could wisely attempt to answer,” evasively answered the cautious hunter.
“But you must have some reasons for what you said,” persisted the other.
“Reasons founded upon guesses are poor things to build a statement on,” rejoined the hunter. “Half the mischief and ill-feeling in the world comes from statements so made. And, guessing aloud is often no better. I rather think, all things considered, we had better not stop at the chief’s, this time. I can show you where he lives, as we pass; and, if that will do, we will now handle oars, and be on our way.”
Much wondering at the enigmatical words of the other, Claud, without further remark, put in his oar and thoughtfully rowed on, till they had passed round the head of the island; when, on the indication of the hunter, they stretched away towards a distant promontory, on the northeastern shore of the lake. A steady and vigorous rowing of half an hour brought them within a few hundred yards of the headland, for which they had been steering; when the hunter lifted his oar, and said:
“There! let the canoe run on alone, a while, and give me your attention. Now, you see,” he continued, pointing in shore to the right, “you see that opening in the woods, yonder, on the southern slope extending down near the lake, eighty rods or such a matter off, don’t you? Well, that, and divers other openings, where the timber has been cut down and burnt over, for planting corn, scattered about in the woods in different places, as well as a large tract of the surrounding forest-land, are the possessions of the chief.”
“But where is their house?”
“Down near the lake, among the trees. You can’t see much of it, but it is a smart, comfortable house, like one of our houses, and built by a carpenter; for the chief used formerly to handle considerable money, got by the furs caught by himself, and by the profits on the furs he bought of the St. Francis Indians, who came over this way to hunt. But stay: there are some of the family at his boat-landing. I think it must be Fluella and her Indian half-brother. She is waving a handkerchief towards us. Let us wait and see what she wants.”
The female, whose trim figure, English-fashioned dress, and graceful motions went to confirm the hunter’s conjectures, now appeared to turn and give some directions to the boy, who immediately disappeared, but in a few minutes came back, entered a canoe, and put off towards the spot where our two voyagers were resting on their oars. In a short time the canoe came up, rowed by an ordinary Indian boy of about fourteen, who, pulling alongside, held up a neatly-made, new, wampum-trimmed hunting pouch, and said:
“The chief send this Mr. Claud Elwood,—gift. Fluella say, wish Mr. Phillips and Mr. Claud Elwood good time.”
And so saying, and tossing the article to Claud, he wheeled his canoe around, and, without turning his head or appearing to hear the compliments and thanks that both the hunter and Claud told him to take to the chief and his daughter, sped his way back to the landing.
“There, young man!” exclaimed the obviously gratified hunter, “that is a present, with a meaning. I would rather have it, coming as it does from an Indian, and that Indian such a man as the chief,—I would rather have it, as a pledge of watchfulness over your interests in the settlement, whether you are present there or absent,—than a white man’s bond for a hundred dollars; and I would also rather have it, as a token of faith, given when you are roaming this northern wilderness, than a passport from the king of England. The chief’s Totem, the bald eagle, is woven in, I see, among the ornaments. Every Indian found anywhere from the great river of Canada to the sea eastward will know and respect it, and know, likewise, how to treat the man to whom it was given.”
“But how,” asked Claud, “could stranger Indians, whom I encountered, know to whom it was given, or that I did not find, buy, or steal the article?”
“Let an Indian alone for that. You have but three fingers on your left hand, I have noticed.”
“True, the little finger was accidentally cut clean off by an axe, when I was a child; but what has that to do with the question?”
“Enough to settle it. Do you notice something protruding as if from under the protecting wing of the eagle of the Totem, there?”
“Yes; and surely enough it resembles a human hand, with only three fingers.”
“That is it; and you may yet, in your experiences in these rough and sometimes dangerous wilds, know the value of that gift.”
“At any rate, I feel gratified at this mark of the chief’s good will; the more because I was so little expecting it, especially at this time. How could they have possibly made out who I, or indeed either of us, was, at such a distance?”
“A very natural inquiry, but answered when I tell you that Fluella has a good spy-glass, that a year or two ago she brought, among other curious trinkets, from her other home in the old settlement. And she makes it often serve a good purpose, too. She has spied out, for her father’s killing, many a moose or deer that had come down to the edge or into the water of the lake round the shores to drink, eat wild-grass, or cool themselves, as well as many a flock of wild geese, lighting here on their fall or spring passages. She knew, I think, about the day we were to start, and, being on the lookout, saw the rest of our company passing off here to the west, an hour or two ago, and, not seeing us among them, expected us to be along somewhere in this direction. Now, is all explained?”
“Yes, curiously but satisfactorily.”
“Then, only one word more on the subject: let me advise you not to show that hunting-pouch when we join the company, nor wear it till we are off on our separate ranges. I have my reasons, but mustn’t be asked to give them.”
“All this is odd, Mr. Phillips; but, taking it for granted that your reasons are good ones, I will comply with your advice.”
“Very well. The whole matter being now disposed of, let us move on round the point, and into the large cove we shall find round there. We mustn’t give up about game so. No knowing what may yet be done in that line.”
Having risen to his feet, raised his hunting-cap, and bowed his adieu to the still lingering maiden on shore, Claud now joined his companion at the oars; when they rapidly passed round the headland, and soon entered the bay-like recess of water, which, sweeping round in a large wood-fringed circle, opened upon the view immediately beyond. After skirting along the sometimes bold and rocky, and sometimes low and swampy, thickly-wooded shore, with a sharp lookout for whatever might come within range of the eye, but without stopping for any special examination till they had reached the most secluded part of the cove, the hunter suspended his oar, and signified his intention of landing. Accordingly, running in their canoe by the side of an old treetop extending into the water, and, throwing their mooring-line around one of its bare limbs, they stepped noiselessly ashore, and ascended the bank, when the hunter, pausing and pointing inward, said, in a low, suppressed tone:
“There, within a short distance from us, commences one of the thickest windfall jungles in these parts, and extends up nearly to the chief’s outermost cornfield, about half a mile off. I have been threatening to come here some time; and if, as I will propose, we go into the tangle, and get through, or half through, without encounter of some kind, I confess I shall be uncommonly disappointed. But, before entering, let us sit down on this old log a few minutes, and, while looking to our flints and priming, keep our ears open for such sounds as may reach them.”
And, bending low his head, with closed eyes, and an ear turned towards the thicket, the hunter listened long and intently in motionless silence, after which he quickly rose, and, while glancing at his gun-flint and priming, said:
“There are no distinct sounds, but the air is disturbed in the kind of way that I have frequently noticed when animals of some size were in the vicinity. Let us forward into the thicket, spreading out some ten rods apart, and worming ourselves among the windfalls, with a stop and a thorough look every few rods of our progress. Should you start up a panther, which ain’t very likely, you had better whistle for me, before firing; but, if any thing else, blaze away at it.”
Nodding his assent, and starting off in a course diverging to the right of the one he perceived his companion to be taking, Claud slowly, and as he best could, made his way forward, sometimes crawling under, and sometimes clambering over the tangled masses of fallen trees, which, with a thick upshooting second growth, lay piled and crossed in all conceivable shapes and directions before him. After proceeding in this manner thirty or forty rods, he paused, for the third or fourth time, to look and listen; but lastly quite as much for his companion as for game, for, with all his powers, he could detect no sound indicating that the latter could be anywhere in the vicinity. While thus engaged, he heard a small, shrill, plaintive sort of cry, as of a little child, coming from somewhere above him; when, casting up his eyes, he beheld a large raccoon sidling round a limb, and seemingly winking and nodding down towards him. With the suppressed exclamation of “Far better than nothing,” he brought his piece to his face and fired; when the glimpse of a straight-falling body, and the heavy thump on the ground that followed, told him that the object of his aim was a “dead coon.” But his half-uttered shout of exultation was cut short by the startling report of a rifle, a little distance to the rear, on his left. And the next moment a huge old bear, followed by a smaller one, came smashing and tearing through the brush and tree-tops directly towards him. And with such headlong speed did the frightened brutes advance upon him, that he had scarce time to draw his clubbed rifle before the old one had broke into the little open space where he stood, and thrown herself on her haunches, in an attitude of angry defiance. Recoiling a step in the only way he could move, and expecting the next moment to find himself within the fatal grasp of the bear, if he did not disable her, Claud aimed and struck with all his might a blow at her head. But, before the swiftly-descending implement reached its mark, it was struck by the fending paw of the enraged brute, with a force that sent its tightly-grasping owner spinning and floundering into the entangled brushwood, till he landed prostrate on the ground. And, ere he had time to turn himself, the desperate animal had rushed and trampled over him, and disappeared through a breach effected in one of the treetops that had hemmed him in and prevented his retreat from such a doubtful, hand-to-hand encounter. As the discomfited young huntsman was rising to his feet, his eyes fell upon Phillips, hurrying forward, with looks of lively concern; which, however, as he leaped into the small open space comprising the battle-ground, and saw how matters stood, at first gave place to a ludicrous smile, and then to a merry peal of laughter.
“I can’t say I blame you much for your merriment,” said Claud, joining, though rather feebly, in the laugh, as he brushed himself and picked up his rifle; “for, to be upset and run over by a bear would have been about the last thing I should have dreamed of myself.”
“O well,” said the other, checking his risibles, “it had better turn out a laughing than a crying matter, as it might have done if you had kept your footing; for, if you had not been overthrown and run over, you would have probably, in this cramped-up place, stood up to be hugged and scratched in a way not so very agreeable; and I rather guess, under the circumstances, you may as well call yourself satisfied to quit so; for the bears have left you with a whole skin and unbroken ribs, though they have escaped themselves where, with our time, it will be useless to follow them. But, if you had not fired just as you did, we would have had all three of them.”
“What! have you killed one?” asked Claud, in surprise.
“To be sure I have,” answered the hunter. “Then you supposed it was one of your rough visitors I fired at, and missed? No, no. I had got one of the black youngsters in range, and was waiting for a chance at the old one, knowing if I killed her first the young ones would take to the trees, where they could easily be brought down. Seeing them, however, on the point of running at the report of your rifle, I let drive at the only one I was sure of; when the two others, they being nearly between us, tacked about and ran towards you. But go get your ’coon, and come along this way, to look at my black beauty.”
“How did you know I had killed a ’coon?” inquired the other.
“Heard him squall before you fired, then strike the ground afterwards with a force that I thought must have killed him, whether your bullet had or not,” replied the hunter, moving off for his bear, with which, tugging it along by a hind leg, he soon joined Claud, who was threading his way out with his mottled trophy swung over his shoulder.
“Why, a much larger one than I supposed,” exclaimed the latter, turning and looking at the cub; “really, a fine one!”
“Ain’t he, now?” complacently said the hunter. “There, heft him; must weigh over half a hundred, and as fat as butter,—for which he is doubtless indebted to the chief’s cornfield. And I presume we may say the same of that streaked squaller of yours, which I see is an uncommonly large, plump fellow. Well,” continued the speaker, shouldering the cub, “we may now as well call our hunt over, for to-day,—out of this plaguey hole as soon as we can, and over the lakes to camp, as fast as strong arms and good oars can send us.”
On, after reaching and pushing off their now well-freighted canoe, on,—along the extended coast-line of this wild lake, westward to the great inlet, up the gently inflowing waters of that broad, cypress-lined stream, to the Maguntic, and then, tacking eastward, around the borders of that still wilder and more secluded lake,—on, on, they sped for hours, until the ringing of the axe-fall, and the lively echo of human voices in the woods, apprised them of their near approach to the spot which their companions had selected, both for their night’s rest and permanent head-quarters for the season.