I I ./ 1 DOGS, WOLVES, MURDERERS OF MY KINDRED, DIE LIKE D -,GS AXD WOLVES. Pa^fi 29-x HUNTING ADVENTURES IN THE NORTHERN WILDS; OE, A TRAMP IN THE CHATEAUGAY WOODS, OVER HI1XS, LAKES, AND FOREST STREAMS, BY S. H. HAMMOND. " For myself I prefer the quiet of the country, a ramble along the rivers and brooks* or better still, some wild forest dell, where the birds are merry all the day, ana where no unseemly revelry breaks the stillness of night." NEW YORK: DERBY & JACKSON", 119 NASSAU ST., 1859 ENTERED, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1&54, by S. H. HAMMOND, In the Clerk's C.^fflce of the District Court for the Northern District of New York. 8T BREOTTP3.. BY THOMAS B. SMITH, 216 William St. N. V. TO HIS EXCELLENCY, HORATIO SEYMOUR. BEFORE you became a leader of a great political party, ^r the chief magistrate of a great State, you loved tha woods, the lakes, the deep shadows of the forest and t,he mountain streams to throw the fly for the speckled trout in river or brook, " To follow the stag, o'er the slippery crag, And to chase the bounding roe" Permit me, then, respectfully to dedicate to you, not as the highest executive officer of the Empire State, but aa a chivalrous and enthusiastic sportsman, the following vork. Tea ACTTHO*. 4 PREFACE. IF the reader will lay before him a map of the counties of Clinton, Franklin, St. Lawrence and Essex, and begin- ning at the Chazy lake, run his eye along thence to Brad- ley's Lake, then to the Chateaugay, then west to Ragged Lake and Indian Lake, and so down through the series of small lakes, to the St. Regis, and then to the Saranacs, and down along again through three small lakes to the Racquette river, and then down that beautiful watercourse to Tupper's Lake, and to Long Neack, he will note a broad sweep of country, containing millions of acres, which, when the following pages were written, was a perfect wilderness. He can trace out a circle of some two hundred miles in circumference, enclosing natural scenery the most wild and romantic, lakes and rivers the most beautiful imagin- able. I was out there several weeks in the woods, along the streams, and floating on those beautiful lakes, and saw during that time no face of a white man, save that of my vi PKEFACE. guide, or perhaps my own, reflected back from the quiet depths of some of those pure waters, that nestle so qui- etly among the ancient forests and the hills. I was on a " tramp," partly for health and partly for pleasure. I had no intention of publishing a book of ad- ventures, but I kept memoranda in pencil in small field- books, and after my return wrote them out as my leisure permitted. Some three or four of the first chapters were published in the shape of letters to editors of my ac- quaintance. The balance rested until I became connected with the press, as the editor of the Albany State Register. I looked upon the manuscript as a sort of fund, upon which I could draw for light reading, with which to amuse my readers when pressed for "copy." Upon submitting it to one of the proprietors of the paper for his aid in making selections, he surprised me somewhat by saying it was all readable, and advised me to begin at the begin- ning, without troubling myself by making extracts. I followed his advice, and a large portion of the work was thus published in chapters, in my paper. It was well spoken of by friends, in whose judgment I had confidence, and was somewhat extensively copied by the press. I was advised to publish the whole in a book form. I submitted it to a gentleman in the publishing line, and here it is, my first, and very possibly my las f effort, at authorship. It PREFACE. vii does not challenge criticism. It makes no special preten- sions to literary merit. People who love nature, who have a taste for the old woods, the lakes, and streams, and the forest sports, may read, and possibly be amused by it. They will doubtless find that it contains many faults, if they choose to look for them. There was, and doubtless still is, plenty of fish, plenty of deer, plenty of sport in that wild region, and, I venture to say, that there is no locality in the United States, at all to be compared with it in natural beauty of scenery. I was over most of the ground again last . fall. The places I visited five years ago, are vastly easier of access now than they were then. The tourist can now go from Port Kent, on Lake Champlain, to the foot of the I^>wer Saranac, in a day. He will travel the whole distance, save about twelve miles, on a plank road, and the balance on a tolerably smooth common road. All making the most delightful day's journey imaginable. On the banks of the Lower Saranac, literally at the end of the road, he will find " Martin's House," a new and comfortable country hotel, kept by pleasant, obliging peo- ple. Here he will hire a boatman, with his boat and tent, cooking utensils, and a store of provisions, and go a hun- dred miles, if he chooses, " outside of a fence," over the most beautiful lakes, and along the most delightful rivers viii PREFACE. and streams that the eye ever looked upon, but all wild, remember- all as nature threw them down there, among old primeval things. His journey ings will not be toil- some, he will have no tramping in the woods, save occa- sional short carrying places, over which his boatman will march with his craft, like a great turtle with his shell on his back. He will see much that I saw, and have at- tempted to describe, and a good deal that I did not see, perhaps. And if he loves nature, and takes matters easy, and gives himself time, he will come out of the woods, as I did, a stronger, healthier^ and a wiser man. THE AUTHOR. J H t Ml 1 CHAPTER I. PAGK Ho! FOB THE WILD-WOODS! THE LAKES AND THE MOUNTAIN STREAMS . 13 CHAPTER II. THE PRISON IN THE WOODS THE CHAZY TROUT FISHING HUNT- ING BY TORCHLIGHT . 18 CHAPTER III. RAGGED LAKE A FISHPOND ON THE MOUNTAIN THE BARK CANOE A DEER CHASE ON THE WATER .... 26 CHAPTER IV. INDIAN LAKE THE GROUND CEDAR AND THE FAWN THE LAKE TROUT THE CATAMARAN THE OWLS . , ?* CHAPTER V. A TROUT-STREAM PARTRIDGES THE FISHER NAMING A LAKE A THUNDER-STORM IN THE FOREST MEACHAM'S LAKE. . . 49 CHAPTER VI. MORNING- IN THE WOODS MY GUIDE A FIRST VISIT TO THE CITY A MISTAKE AND ITS CONSEQUENCES^ 61 X CONTENTS. CHAPTER VII. :UNTING ON THE CRUS ADMINISTERED BY A HUNTER A CAPTIVE AND ITS EELEASE . 68 PAGE THE DESERTED HUT HUNTING ON THE CRUST FOREST JUSTICE CHAPTER VIII. GOING ROUND THE HUDSON THE PANTHER AND ITS CUBS FOREST COOKERY 7T CHAPTER IX. THE LOST CHILD SHACK 87 CHAPTER X. DREAMS THE PRAIRIES ON FIRE A WOOD-DEMON'S TORCH . 98 CHAPTER XI. ST. EEGIS LAKE THE BALD EAGLE His HABITS A PRIZE . 106 CHAPTER XII. THE LAW OF THE WOODS BIG CLEAR POND A CHASE AFTER A DEER A MOOSE PATH lit CHAPTER XIII. THE UPPER SARANAC A SONG ON THE WATER A WOODMAN s NOTION OF THE PAST, THE PRESENT, AND THE FUTURE, OF AMERICA 126 CHAPTER XIV. A SPORTING EXCURSION A FOREST CHASE THE Music OF THE HOUNDS THE MAN WHO KILLED THE PANTHER AND THE Bio BUCK 136 CHAPTER XV. TOUGH TARNS A SHELTER IN A STORM AN ASTONISHED BEAR AN UNINVITED G-UE&T, AND HIS UNCEREMONIOUS EXPULSION . 146 CONTENTS. XI CHAPTER XVI. PAGE SIGNS OP RAIN THE TREE PROG A RAINY DAY IN THE FOREST 153 CHAPTER XVII. A RAINY MORNING CLEARING UP A NEW COUNTRY A HALF- BREED AND HIS FAMILY 163 CHAPTER XVIII. STONEY BROOK AMPERSAND CREEK TROUT RACKET RIVER A FLYING SHOT AT A BUCK 112 CHAPTER XIX. A WOODMAN'S SERMON His RELIGION OP NATURE His ARGU- MENT AGAINST INFIDELITY 189 CHAPTER XX. THE SILENT ENERGY OP NATURE HER WORKSHOPS HER JOUR- NEYMEN 202 CHAPTER XXI. THE EAGLE AND HIS PREY THE LOON His HABITS THE PAR- TRIDGE THE SQUIRREL AND THE FOREST MICE 209 CHAPTER XXII. THE GRAY OWL THE WILD BIRDS THE DUMB ANIMAL WISER IN HIS INSTINCTS, " THAN MAN IN HIS REASON THE FOLLY OF CRIME 219 CHAPTER XXIII. THE JESUIT'S JOURNAL WILD BULLS AND Cows, WITH ANTLERS LIKE THE STAG THE " TAMING" OP THE INDIANS .... 228 CHAPTER XXIV. A WILD CAT LONG NEAK ROUND LAKE THE LOWER SARANAO - A FIGHT BETWEEN A PANTHER AND A BEAR . ... 236 Xii CONTENTS. CHAPTER XXV. HUH THE GROWTH OP AMERICA ITS PAST, PRESENT, AND FUTURE A WOODMAN'S IDEA OP EXPANSION ......... 246 CHAPTER XXVI. MANIFEST DESTINY YOUNG AMERICA ON THE MOVE . . . .258 CHAPTER XXVII. THE LOWER SARANAC THE BALD EAGLE UMBRELLA ISLAND BALL-FACE MOUNTAIN MOUNT MARCY 2 TO CHAPTER XXVIII. THE STORY OP OLD PETE MEIGS THE MASSACRE, AND THE RETRIBUTION THAT FOLLOWED 286 CHAPTER XXIX. A DBERLICK THE YERMONTER AND HIS LICKLOG SHOOTING THE WRONG ANIMAL 300 CHAPTER XXX. OLD SHADRACH, AND THE WATER EATTLESNAKE TUCKER'S NO- TION OP SLAVERY THE END OF THAT INSTITUTION AT LAST . 308 CHAPTER XXXI. MOONLIGHT ON THE WATER A VILLAGE WIPED our THE Au SABLE KEESEVILLE THE GORGE AN ORE PIT . . 324 HO ! TOR THB WlLDWOODS ! THE LAXE8 AND TH3 MOUNTAIN STREAMS. READER Have you ever been away in the wild woods, beyond the range of civilization, where the sound of the hammer, the lowing of flocks and herds, the voice of the ploughman, as he cries " Gee up ! Gee whoa 1" to his weary team, were never heard? Have you ever stood on the margin of some beautiful lake, as it lay slumbering in the midst of nature's wild luxuri- ance, above which the mountains reared their gigantic heads to the clouds,, and around which the tall trees stood as " God and nature" made them, unscarred by the woodman's axe, sighing and moaning in the sum- mer winds that swept among them? Have you all alone, by yourself or with an experienced woodman, 14 HILLS AND LAKES. in a little craft hewn from the solid trunk of some gigantic pine, explored its little bays, its secluded inlets canopied by the wide-spreading arms of the trees, and festooned by the wild vines hanging grace- fully from the branches above you? Have you listened to the voice of the tiny wave, as it broke in ripples on the white sand at your feet, or the song of the little brook, as it danced over the rocks, to mingle with the pure waters before you? Have you heard, of a moonlight night, as you floated on its silvery bosom, the song of the whip-poor-will, the solemn hoot- ing of the owl, the deep bass of the frog, the shrill cry of the loon, the call of the wood duck, and the thou- sand other mysterious voices that come up from wood and lake all mingling in the wild harmony of nature's nightly forest hymn? If you have not, throw down your book or your pen, close your pon- derous ledger, cast away your briefs, give care to the dogs, and turn your back upon the glare and heat of the city, its eternal jostlings and monotonous noises, and fly to the deep shadows of the mountains, the forest dells, and the running brooks away from clus- tered houses, beyond the green fields, and r ;ugh it for a few weeks in the woods, among the tall trees and THE WILDWOODS. 15 the streams, where the lakes lay sleeping alone in the northern wilds. In these times of railroads and steamboats, a few hundred miles are as nothing. You rise in the morn- ing in the heart of the Empire State, the centre of a circle containing three millions of people. You sleep at night on the circumference of that circle, on the confines of a broad sweep of country, as yet scarcely explored, known only to the bold hunter, who spends all his seasons save the winter, in the pursuit of the game that dwells only in the depths of the forest. Jump aboard of the cars at Troy for Whitehall. Tarry not a moment at Saratoga ; there are people there searchers after pleasure or pelf. The rich, the gay, the fashionable are there ; invalids in pursuit of health, and sharpers in pursuit of plunder, all congre- gate there. Leave them behind you, and ho ! for the wildwoods, the lakes, and the forest streams. Stop not at Whitehall, pleasant though it be ; there are people there too. A steamboat will hurry you to Plattsburgh ; jump aboard and be off ! You will soon be gliding along the beautiful waters of the Ohamplain. You will see " Old Ti.," the surrender of which, old Ethan Allen, as he, with his Green Moun- 16 HILLS AND LAKES. tain boys came tumbling over the walls, demanded in the "name of the great Jehovah, and the Conti- nental Congress 1" You will see the ruins on Crown Point grim monuments of a vanished age ! You will see on your left the mountains of Essex, lifting their bald heads to the clouds. On the right you will see flocks and herds, feeding in green fields that stretch back to the base of the hills, and away off in the distance, the Green Mountains looming up in solemn grandeur, on the summits of which the mists of heaven rests, and along whose sides gigantic shadows chase each other, as the light clouds flit be- fore the sun. Plattsburgh is classic ground. It was the scene of a notable sea-fight, and of a hard contest on the land. But leave it behind you. Battle-fields are common- place; you can find them nearer home, where the bones of slaughtered men are more abundant, and the halo of blood-bought glory is brighter. Leave fighting-men to moralize over the places of the fight, and be off for Dannemora, the prison in the woods. There you will be at the end of the road. There civilization has made a pause. Tame life will be behind you, while all before you will be forest, wild THE WILDWOODS. 17 and unbroken, luxuriant and solemn, tall trees and running brooks, quiet lakes and rugged mountains. Old primeval things all, as they were spoken into existence by the voice of God. IL THI PRISON IN THB WOODS. THE CHAZT TSOTTT PISHIHO. HUNTING BY TORCHLIGHT I ARRIVED at Dannemora on the 26th of June. My old friend seized upon my baggage and sent it to his house, and then gave me my choice to follow it or quarrel with him. "We had been friends too long to quarrel, so I followed my trunk, and made my head- quarters with him. To those who know him, nothing need be said of his kindness and hospitality, his quiet and gentlemanly deportment, his manly sincerity and firmness of character. To those who do not know him, it needs only be said, "he is every inch a man." Some five miles from Dannemora, in the woods, lays Chazy Lake, on the banks of which is a shantee erected for the benefit of the fishermen that visit it. The way to this lake lays along a path through TROUT-FISHING. 19 woods, that winds up and over a mountain some fif- teen hundred feet in elevation. The morning after my arrival I left Dannemora, and struck into the woods. I procured a guide, who was perfectly familiar with all the wild region which I proposed to visit, who carried a large pack of pro- visions, and other things necessary for our tramp in the woods. Among the tools regarded as indispen- sable, were an axe and augur. He carried no gun. For myself my load consisted of a rifle, and my fish- ing apparatus, including basket and rods. How I love the woods! the deep shadows and the tall trees the music of the woods too, its thousand voices all tuned to harmony, and all singing of primitive life and happiness. I love the mountain stream as fee goes dashing and frisking over the rocks, diving under the logs, whirling away under caverned banks, where the trout sleeps, dancing over the pebbles and spreading abroad quietly, as if asleep in the still places. We arrived at Chazy, after a weary walk of three hours. It is a beautiful sheet' of water, five miles in length, by one or more in breadth. Above it, on the south and east, tower lofty mountains covered with gigantic timber, while 20 HILLS AND LAKES. on the west and north the old forest stretches away in all its primeval grandeur. It is indented with beautiful bays, in which a boat may float unseen from the broad lake itself. A hundred little streams come dancing and laughing down precipitous ledges, or from little inlets, into which our canoe would glide, while above us the branches of the trees, festooned with wild vines met, like an arbor in a lady's garden "We cast our lines in Largo Bay." Header, did you ever throw the fly to tempt tho silvery denizen of the lake, or river, to his destruction? Have you watched him, as it skimmed like a living insect along the surface, dart from his hiding-place, and rush upon the tempting but deceitful morsel ; and have you noticed his astonishment, when he found the hook was in his jaw ? Have you watched him, as he bent your slender rod "like a reed shaken by the wind," in his efforts to free himself, and then have you reeled him to your hand, and deposited him in your basket, as the spoil of your good right arm ? If you have not, leave the dull, monotonous, every-day things around you, and flee to the Chazy Lake. If you have and love the sport, still tramp over the HUNTING BY TORCHLIGHT. 21 hills, beneath the cool shades of the brave old trees, to the Chazy. We did not wantonly waste the good things of God. In ten minutes we had secured trout enough for our supper and breakfast, and our consciences would permit us to go no further. We returned to our shantee, and having supped, prepared for a differ- ent kind of sport in the evening. The forest abounds with deer, and these animals in the night come to the water to get rid of the insects that torment them, and to feed on the lilies and grasses that grow in the shal- low water near the shore. While thus feeding, you may paddle a canoe, with a light in the bow, literally up to them, provided the light is so arranged that you are behind it in the shade. They will stand gazing fearlessly at the light until the canoe, in some instances, fairly touches them. With a small torch of fatwood in the bow of our dug-out, we shoved from the shore about nine o'clock, in pursuit of deer. We moved slowly and silently along the margin of the lake, my guide seated at the stern of the canoe, and I crouched in the bow, just behind the light, and shaded from it by broad sheets of bark, so arranged that the rays would fall on the forward sight of my rifle. We had 22 HILLS AND LAKES. gone but a short distance when I discovered, some eight or ten rods in advance of us, what to me seemed two balls of fire, but which in fact was the reflection of our light from the staring eyeballs of an old buck that had been feeding in the lake. Unmindful of the admonitions of my guide, I leaned over the side of the boat to get a better view of his buckship, when the light fell upon my face. I have been called a good- looking man, and told that my features were comely, but that buck thought otherwise, for the moment he saw it he bounded away, and went whistling and snorting up the mountain. He had no appreciation of manly beauty ! We passed silently on into a little bay, where the same phenomenon of double lights presented itself. Slowly and silently the boat glided along towards the spot, when a slight deviation from our course showed us a large deer gazing stupidly at our light. We ad- vanced to within some forty feet of where he stood, when the canoe came to a stand, and I fired. The ball went through his brain, and he fell dead. We were now provided with venison, and we returned to our shantee. Fatigue makes rest pleasant, and we slept soundly on green hemlock boughs that night. HUNTING BY TORCHLIGHT. 23 A smudge protected us from the musquitoes and black flies, and our slumbers were unbroken. The next day we started for Bradley's pond, a little lake some five miles deeper in the forest, and midway between the Shazee and the Upper Chatau- gay. On the bank we built a temporary shantee, and I threw my fly for a few minutes but it was wasteful to take trout as I caught them there, and I desisted. We coasted this little sea before evening. It is per- haps two miles in circumference, but has little that is attractive about it, save that it lays there all alone in the forest, and great trees hem it in on all sides. Its shores are low and marshy, and I cannot recommend it for its beauty. In the evening we prepared a torch, and struck out on the water in pursuit of deer. It is marvellous, the number there were, along the shores of this little lake. It affords, however, abundant pas- ture for them. Pond-lilies and grasses grow in the shallow water in great profusion. The pond-lily, in these lakes, differs from any I have ever seen else- where. It grows up from the bottom, sometimes from a depth of fifteen feet, with a great rough stem like a cabbage-stalk, of the same pithy and fibrous texture, as large as a man's arm, until it reaches the surface, 24 HILLS AND LAKES. and there shoots out a hundred tendrils all round, at the end of each one having a great round leaf. From each of these great stems, the leaves thus arranged, and connected with it by the small tendrils, spread over a surface of four or six feet in diameter. It is upon these large stems that the deer feed. They manage to loosen them in some way from the bottom, and feed upon them as they float upon the surface. We could hear them stamping in the water, and the grating sound of their teeth, as they bit into the stems of the pond-lilies. Every few rods, double lights would glisten before us, and strange to say, the stupid beasts would stand until the canoe approached within six feet of them, gazing in apparent amazement at the strange light that was advancing upon them, but when we looked out from the shadow and showed them our faces, Lord ! how they would snort and run. "We had no occasion for venison, and we did them no harm that night. In the morning we packed up again, and dove deeper into the forest. We struck for the Cha- eaugay (called Shatagee) Lakes, and about ten o'clock came to the head of the Upper Lake. This lake is often visited by sportsmen in the summer months, and has as often, almost been described. It is rarely, how- HUNTING BY TORCHLIGHT. 25 ever, that it has been visited in the direction we came. It has usually been approached from the Lower Lake, on the lower portion of which is a settlement. In- deed, I was told that it could not well be reached fr jm the Chazy. But my guide knew the woods, and I followed him. I had good sport every mile of the way. We followed the outlet of Bradley's Lake, and crooked enough it was too. But the stream abounds in trout, and I shot a fine deer and two wood-rabbits on the route. III. R4.003D LAKE. A FISHPOND ON THE MOUNTA N. THE BAHX CANOE. A DEER CHASE ON THE WATB'.R. I STARTED the next morning for Eagged Lake, some ten miles deeper in tne wilderness. On this ex- pedition we were guided solely by the instinct, or if you please, the judgment of my guide. We found, no path no footsteps or marked trees to point out the way, but through " tangle brush," and over logs felled by the strong winds, we travelled on. 'Ten miles in the wilderness, of a hot summer day, with a rifle, fishing-rod, and basket, is a journey which must not be lightly considered ; a mile, under such circum- stances, requires a multitude of steps and many drops of "the sweat of a man's brow." True, the way is enlivened by the song of the forest bird, the chirp of the squirrel, and the murmuring of the mountain brooks ; still the feet become weary, and the mossy THE POND ON THE MOUNTAIN. 27 bank, of some wild stream looks pleasant, as a resting- place from the toil of travel. Our way at one place lay across a hill, lower to he sure than the mountains on our left, but which rose to an elevation of some eight hundred or a thousand feet above the ravine that wound around its base. Here r on the very summit of a hill, we came to a pond some two hundred yards in circumference, the water of which was beautifully clear and cold ; two small streams from its opposite sides started off in contrary directions, on their journey to "the great deep," the one to empty itself into the Chazy, and the other to wander, the Lord knows where, save to its final des- tination, the mighty St. Lawrence and the ocean. Though blest with two outlets, the pond had no inlet visible to the eye. It was in fact a great spring or reservoir, on a dividing ridge, which received its waters from below, to send them off through the channels I have mentioned. The land around it was marshy, but covered with small boulders, which lay around the edge with the regularity almost of a wall. Having rigged my pole and line, I stepped from rock to rock to the margin of the pond, and threw ray fly. It had scarcely touched the water when it 28 HILLS AND LAKES. was seized by a speckled trout, weighing, perhaps, a quarter of a pound. 1 caught six more " of the same sort" as fast as I could throw mj fly, and could have caught any quantity ; but we needed only enough for a dinner, and I forbore. In the meantime my guide had kindled a fire by the side of a fallen tree, and had already upon the coals a steak, cut from the deer I had killed on the previous night. This together with the trout, subjected to the same broiling process, and bread and butter, constituted our dinner. Let not your fancy picture mahogany tables, white napkins, silver forks, China dishes, and cushioned chairs, these are far removed from the simple wants and necessities of life they belong to the cities to the age of luxury and studied refinement. Clean birch bark, just stripped from the tree, and a jack-knife, are the simple implements of a forest dinner. "Fingers were made before forks," and a hungry man must not be over delicate about using them. I am a temperate man, and can talk right elo- quently about the evils of strong drink, but the pocket pistol, from the pack of my guide, loaded with choice brandy, did me no hurt that day, though dis- charged at my own head. THE BARK CANOE. 29 Having dined, and for half an hour rested our weary limbs, we shouldered our traps and marched on : about three o'clock we found ourselves at Kagged Lake, as beautiful a sheet of water as ever poet sang of, or enthusiast described. On this lake we found no boat ; few amateur fishermen have had the courage to visit its seclusion ; and the hunter, as he ranges the wilderness, finds no use for a water craft. But my guide was a man of experience, and of vast resource in all that related to wood craft. " We will," said he, " coast this lake as we have done the rest, and that in a vessel of our own construction." In the neighborhood of the lake are scattered fir trees of large growth, one of which my guide selected for his purpose, and with his axe felled it to the ground. From the bark stripped from the trunk of this tree, we had, long before sundown, constructed a canoe which, by the exercise of great caution, and by keeping " our chew of tobacco precisely in the middle of the mouth," enabled us to navigate the lake. It was a curiosity in its way, small saplings or "staddles," as my guide termed them, cut first some six feet in length, then being nearly severed in the middle, were bent together like clamps, confined and 30 HILLS AND LAKES. held in contact the ends of the bark; these formed the bow and stern ; tow, which had found a place in fiie pack of my guide, was stuffed into the crevices ; over this was poured melted gum. gathered from around the knots of the tree we had felled, and from cracks in the unsound trunks of others around us ; sticks stretched across from side to side gave it shape, and slim "staddles" laid lengthwise in the bottom, gave it strength to sustain our weight. Paddles were hewn from slabs, split from the .trunk of the tree we had felled. Being all prepared, we launched our homely vessel, and seating ourselves in the bottom on a cushion of boughs, we shoved from the shore. " She walked the water like a thing of life." So long as we remained seated on. the bottom, it was steady enough, but when, from our cramped position, it became necessary to change our posture, it required the skill of a rope dancer to preserve our equilibrium, and prevent one's self from being plumped into the cold waters of the lake. This sheet of water is most appropriately named. Its outlines are peculiarly irregular, most emphatic- ally ragged. Here a rocky bluff thrusts its long nose BAGGED LAKE. 81 seaward, while just beyond a wild lagoon winds far inland, now broad and again growing narrower, until it terminates in a shady cavern, the roof of which ks composed of the branches of tall trees lovingly inter twined, forming an arbor of the densest shade, and most refreshing coolness. Here a sandy beach, shining in the sunlight, along which the little waves ripple, and from which the deer-paths wind away among the willows and alders that skirt it. Here, a sudden and bold descent in the bottom, leaving above it waters of unknown depths, in which the lake-trout makes his home. There a bar stretches far out from the shore, upon which rushes and the tall grasses grow, and further still the brilliant pond-lily glistens in its pure whiteness, like a star resting on the bosorn of the waters. To the south-west Mount Lyon rears his tall head to the clouds ; standing like a gigantic sentinel overlooking forest and lake, and watching in moveless silence the wilderness around him. But few sportsmen have ever penetrated to this lake, and its waters swarm with trout. They have never learned to beware of the "fly," nor been taught to distrust the perilous hook. In their simplicity they take feathers and silk for the gadfly, and the miller, 32 HILLS AND LAKES. X and the worm, coiled upon jour hook, for a genuine wanderer from, the bogs of the marshy bank. " Here they are born, grow great, and die," undisturbed and and unpersecuted by the sportsman. We found the deer, too, more numerous than we l^ad seen them before. Long ere the night shadows had gathered around us, we saw them stealing out from the thickets that skirted the lake. They would walk stealthily and warily into the water, and after stooping their graceful necks to drink, would swim away, as if to indulge a cooling bath and saturate their "red coats" with water, and then return to feed quietly by the shore, secure alike from the annoyan'ce of insects and the heat of a summer sun. In the night, we went out among them with a light in the bow of our canoe, and the number we frightened " into fits" was not small. From their actions, I infer that our features were by no means pleasant to them, for the moment they caught sight of our faces, they ran off with a speed that a race -horse might envy. Our visit will long be remembered by them. The story will go down " to their children, and their chil- dren's children," as the epoch of the advent of strange monsters, who came among them in the night to BAGGED LAKE. 33 frighten their fathers from their propriety, but to our credit it will be told, that we left them unharmed, save by the terrors of our transient presence. We returned to our shantee, and fell asleep under the lullaby of nature's midnight serenade. The next day we coasted the lake, to explore its hundred quiet and secluded nooks. "We found that in the little bays, at the heads of which the mountain streams emptied their cold waters, the speckled trout congregated, while in the deep water, off the bold rocky bluffs, the lake-trou,t most abounded. We dined near the north end of the lake ; our table and our seat was a venerable moss-covered boulder, be- neath which a cold spring bubbled up, and above which, great maples spread their leafy branches like a canopy over us ; protected by a " smudge" from the black fly and musquitoes, we took our siesta, such as weary limbs and a hearty meal can alone give zest to. After luxuriating thus for a couple of hours, we paddled back along the opposite shore, towards oui shantee, to spend the night. On our way we encoun- tered numerous broods of the wood-duck, whose wings were as yet unfledged, but which, under the guardian care of the mother, skimmed away from us, 2* 34 HILLS AND LAKES. and hid themselves among the weeds and willows along the shore. We "lay to" under the cool shadow of a huge fir tree that leaned out from the rocks, to rest awhile rrom our labor, and to enjoy the beauty of the scenery around us. I had just lighted a Havanna, and was giving its "perfume to the breeze," when, from a point just ahead of us, we saw a fine deer step into the lake, and after stooping his head to drink, wade forward and strike out, apparently for the opposite shore. It would seem that he preferred swimming across, to a journey around the lake. We waited until he had got so far from the shore that we could cut him off from returning to it, and then put out in chase of him. The lake was entirely calm ; not a ripple disturbed its glassy surface, save the long wake in the rear of the deer himself. Hearing the sound of our paddles, he turned his head and discovered us. For a moment he seemed to hesitate as to what course tq take ; he looked first in one direction, then in another, as if to ascertain the surest point of escape. We were now between him and the shore, and he struck boldly forward. Our vessel was a clumsy as well as a frail one, and we gained on him but slowly, A DEER CHASE. 35 still we did gain on him. When the chase began, he was some thirty rods in advance of us, swimming for dear life towards the nearest point on the opposite shore, some half a mile or more distant. It was no boy's play to overtake that deer. In the excitement of the race, however, we forgot the labor, and burning heat of the sun, we took no heed to the big drops of sweat that chased each other down our faces, as we pulled with might and main after him. Yet we had no thought of taking his life, that we might easily have done, for my loaded rifle lay in the bottom of our little craft. Our object was a trial of speed, to witness his wild affright, and his desperate efforts to escape our pursuit. Well, we pulled steadily after him ; a stern chase is said to be a long chase, but when we were two-thirds of the way across the lake, our canoe was at his tail. Had we been less ex- cited, it would have seemed to us cruel to witness the agony of his fright. He would plunge forward with an effort that would raise him half out of the water, and then settle down again desperately to his work. With a look of horrible wildness, and nostrils dis- tended, he struggled forward. Once we shouted a wild halo ! as our canoe touched him, and the poor 36 HILLS AND LAKES. animal, regarding himself as lost, bleated out in the extremity of his terror. Still he pressed noMy for- ward, our canoe in fierce and hot pursuit , v Jtil his hoofs touched the bottom, then the chase 1 var up ; a few desperate leaps brought him to the bes-oh, Lad he plunged triumphantly into his native w ft/la. We heard his long bounds, and the crashing of the dry brush growing fainter and fainter, until the / were lost in the distance, and all was still again. That deei will remember us to his dying day, nor shall we soon forget him. There were few dry thi eads in oui garments when the chase was ended, and they were not wet by the waters of the lake. Our acquaintance, like many that are formed in this life, though brief, was impressive. " Slowly," but not " sadly," we paddled back to our brush shantee, and while the sun seemed hanging like a lantern in the tops of the forest trees, we sat down to our supper. We were too weary that night to disturb the deer, and we retired early to our boughs ; we had -to renew our smudge every hour to keep off the insects that 11 revel in human blood." There was little danger of sur neglecting this duty, for as the smoke ceased, the SLEEPING IN THE FOREST. 37 tiny trumpet of the musquitoe sounded in our ears, and the sting of his puny spear admonished us to re- plenish the fire. Few men can sleep late in the forest, especially among those little accustomed to "A lodge in some vast wilderness." The change from the solemn dirge of the night, to the gay joyous song of the morning, as note after note chimes in, to welcome the rising day, is too exhil- < arating to allow of the continuance of slumber. We were up before the sun the next morning. A plunge in the lake from a point of rocks near ouj shantee, dissipated the lassitude that hung upon us and a few throws of the fly provided us a breakfast oJ trout. IV. 1*1 . AB:E. THE GROUND CEDAR AND THE FAWN. THE LAXI TBOFT THE CATAMARAN THE OWT.S IL* ING broken our fast, we took up our line of march, for Indian Lake, another beautiful sheet of water, some eight miles deeper in the wilderness. Were t not for the constant change of objects and scener , such a tramp would be anything but pleas- ant. } Jut new sights and new sounds, new birds and new & >ngs, too, are constantly occurring, so that the excitement of novelty robs travel of much ofrits weariness. Still it requires some nerve on a hot day, to mexsure miles in the forest, by the repetition of footsteps. It is a thing to be considered, and one who sees no charm in a forest life, who hears no music in the wild notes of the birds, and the sighing of the breezes among the leaves of the greenwood, whose ear is deaf to the voice of the running brook, had better THE GROUND-CEDAR. 39 leave it alone. It will interfere with his comfort. We went trudging along, stumbling over boulders and roots, scrambling over huge logs, and around the tops of fallen trees, for an hour or more, when we came to a patch of table land, slightly elevated above the surrounding country. It was comparatively bare of underbrush, and had upon it but few trees of a larger growth. This opening contained perhaps four or five acres, and was covered with short coarse grass and weeds, with here and there a clump of what my guide termed ground-cedar. This shrub grows from a single stem, as large perhaps as a mar>V arm, from which branches spread out along upon, or a few inches from, the ground, to a distance of from six to ten feet, so that one of these shrubs will extend over a circle from ten to twenty feet in diameter, present- ing an evergreen surface of dense foliage, and at no place over twelve inches from the ground. I was ex- amining one of these, when I discovered two beauti- fully bright and soft eyes, peering through the inter- twined branches at me. I was at first startled, but upon examination found them to belong to a fawn, that had been hid away by its dam beneath the i/ / ground-cedar. It was a beautiful little animal, as 40 HILLS AND LAKES. large perhaps as a lamb of a week old. Its color was a light red, bordering on yellow, dotted with a multi- tude of dark spots, of the size of a shilling. Its limbs were delicately and beautifully formed, and its whole structure presented an appearance of peculiar lightness and agility. There it lay, snug in its hiding-place, as if unconscious that one of the greatest enemies of its race was gazing upon it. It is a peculiar instinct of the fawn, while yet young, to remain in the hiding- place in which it is placed by its dam, even though danger and death approach it. It did not offer t~ stir, as I lifted it from its bed of leaves, and held it in my arms, without a struggle on its part, or any attempt at escape. After examining it a few minutes, I placed it quietly in its bed again, and passed on. As we entered the woods, we noticed the white flag of the mother, as she bounded in a circle round us, towards where her little one 1 had been secreted. She had doubtless been watching us as we stood by the spot, and was hastening back to see if her treasure had been stolen. We reached Indian Lake about noon, and erected our shantee for the night. Finding no materials for constructing a boat, we proceeded to make a raft; CONSTRUCTING A RAFT. 41 which should serve as a substitute. In this we found but little difficulty. On the eastern shore, tall fir trees of all sizes may be found, many of which are dead, or as the woodmen term it, dry. These are ex- ceedingly light and buoyant, and four or five of them, of the diameter of eight or ten inches at the butt, and some twenty -five feet in length, laid side by side in the water, and properly fastened together by cross- pieces pinned to them, will easily float the weight of two men. My guide, with his axe and augur, soon succeeded in constructing, such a raft, upon which we fashioned a rude bench at each end, on which to sit. Having provided ourselves with setting poles, we shoved into the lake. Here, as elsewhere, we found no difficulty in supplying ourselves with trout. We poled along the margin of the lake, until in rounding a rocky promontory, we found ourselves suddenly in water too deep for the length of our poles. A breeze, not very strong to be sure, was blowing from the shore, and our raft, under its impulse, put out for the centre of the lake. Having no paddles, and being unable to control our raft, we were forced to see our- selves floating away towards the opposite shore, three- *burths of a mile distant Patience was the remedy 42 HILLS AND LAKES for this involuntary voyage, and as we were in no hurry, having no notes to pay by a given hour, nor railroad station to reach by a given minute, we re- signed ourselves to our fate, and floated quietly on. I had a long line, such as is used in trolling, and we imused ourselves by sounding the depth of the lake. We found it varying from thirty to some eighty feet. When near the centre of the lake it occurred to me, that perhaps in the deep water the great trout, the aristocratic portion of the finny tribe, might hold their court. Do you remember that in one of Cooper's novels, I can't tell which, the old fisherman of the Otsego discourses about the patriarch of the salmon- trout, the old "mossy back," the largest and cunning- est trout in all the lake, the "Sockdolager," as he called him? Well, I thought of the "Sockdolager," and that it might be, that just beneath me, he of the Indian Lake might be reposing ; so I fastened a small trout I had caught near the shore, to the large hook at the end of my trolling-line, and having fastened several bullets to the line by way of sinker, threw out. It had scarcely reached to the depth of sixty feet t when I felt a jerk, which the fisherman knows is not made by any of the " small fry." Hand over hand I SAILING THE RAFT. 43 hauled in, while whatever was at the other end of the line, pulled ancl jerked in a way that proved him to be anything but willing to approach the surface. Being the stronger, of course I had my way, and in a few moments a trout weighing some six pounds, flopped with a jerk upon our raft. A knock on the head with a stick stilled him, and I had one of the genuine " sockdolagers" of the Indian Lake as my captive. In the course of an hour we had floated across the lake, and landed on a sandy beach. Here we found numerous tracks of the deer, and the paths, which led away into the forest, indicated that "the water was much frequented by them. We followed a small stream that entered the lake, in the hope of finding a spring of cold water. In this we were not disap- pointed, for a few rods from the shore we found a beautiful fountain, bubbling up from beneath a gnarled and ancient birch. A cup of this, with a sprinkling of old Cogniac, was exceeding comfortable just then. * Our catamaran, though well enough before the wind, was not a thing upon which we could beat up against it, and we had at least two miles of polling to '44 HILLS AND LAKES. get back to our shantee. This we accomplished in aa many hours. When we came to the promontory from which we took our forced voyage across the lake, my guide went ashore, and peeling long strips of bark from the saplings, fastened them together, thus making a towing-line of sufficient length and strength, and fastening one end to the raft, with the other . jn his hand, he swam round the -point of rocks. Having gained terra firma, he hauled in upon the line, and thus towed the raft round the point, myself keep- ing it off the rocks with my pole. We were weary enough to sleep soundly that night. It must have been past midnight when we were startled from our slum- ber by a terrific scream which sounded at no great distance from us. My first thought in the bewilder- ment of the moment, was that the house was on fire, or that robbers had invaded our dwelling. We sat up, with our eyes wide open, staring at each other, when again that terrific scream sounded directly over us, while scream after scream seemed to answer from every direction around us. Jia indescribable feeling of terror crept over me, and if the truth must be told, my hand was none of the steadiest, as I reached for my rifle. I did reach for it, and, as I grasped it, made A DEE K LEAF. 4o up my mind to die game. Again sounded that awful scream, and again was it .answered from every point of the compass, as if all the demons of the woods were in concert in the horrible din. " Cuss the owls," said my guide, as he opened his mouth, in a gape like the entrance of a railroad tunnel. " Who's afraid," said I, as I stretched out again upon my bed of boughs for sleep. Before the sun rose in the morning, we plunged into the lake for a bath, from the rocky promontory, from which on the previous day, we started on our involuntary cruize across the lake. While perform- ing our ablutions, we noticed a deer, some quarter of a mile or more from us, feeding along the margin of the lake. I took my rifle, stole cautiously to within some twenty rods of him, and resting over a log, fired. He was standing in the edge of the water, di- rectly beneath a rocky bank, three or four feet in height. As my rifle cracked, he leaped at a single bound upon the bank and then back again, some ten feet into the water, dead. The ball had gone through nis heart, and how he could have made two such des- perate leaps, when thus fatally wounded, was and still is to me, a mystery. 46 HILLS AND LAKES. After having breakfasted, we fashioned a pail jf rude oars, and contrived to work them on our c*.ca- inaran. We had no disposition to float across the lake again, and perhaps be becalmed half a mile from the shore, for hours. However, the wind rising, we hoisted a sail, by holding a bush erect, with the butt end in an augur hole in one of the logs. This floated us across? and from the opposite shore we started on a coasting voyage round the lake. I sunk my line in the deep water, and caught another of the large deni- zens of the lake. It is a singular fact, that, so far as I could dis- cover, the trout was the only species of fish in this, or Ragged Lake. No sunfish, chub, shiner, perch, or any of the other kinds, so common in the fresh waters of the country. We thought we could designate, however, three different kinds of trout. A small lightish gray one, that seemed to lurk close under the rocks, where the banks were steep and bluff. These had a few specks upon them, of a dingy brown, like freckles on the face of a fair-skinned girl. Near the mouths of the cold brooks, we found the genuine speckled trout in great numbers, congregated there as if to enjoy the coolness of the mountain streams INDIAN LAKE. 47 Then, in the deep water in the middle of the lake, were the lake trout, varying in size from two to eight, and possibly ten pounds. The ease and readiness with which all these were taken, robbed the fishing somewhat of its romance, for a few minutes would supply us with all we needed, and to destroy more for the mere sport of taking them, seemed like a wanton abuse of the good gifts of God. Near the south end of the lake is a rocky point, bending round in the shape of a crescent, and forming within the curve a little bay of deep water, containing perhaps a quarter of an acre. At the end of this bay, a stream, not large, but exceedingly cold, empties it- self. This little bay literally swarmed with the speckled trout. Standing on a rock a few feet from the shore, I threw my fly. The moment it struck the water, a dozen greedy and hungry fish rose to the surface, and followed in the wake of the one I hooked towards the shore. The least agitation, like the light- ing of an insect on the water, would cause them to rash to the spot; a twig thrown upon the surface would collect a school of them where it fell. It was little sport to catch them, but it was a rich thing to know they were there. I amused myself in cheating 48 HILLS AND LAKES. the silly things in the way that was fun to we, while it only subjected them to disappointment. I broke off the hook from one of my flies, and threw for half an hour among them. They got no supper to be sure, but they were very industrious trying for it, and I have no doubt it was a great mystery to them why they did not succeed. Indian Lake is a circular sheet of water, some five or six miles in circumference. Like all the other lakes in this wilderness, it has many beauties. All around is a dense forest of old primeval trees. On one side, willows and alders skirt the shore, from which grasses, and rushes, and pond-lilies extend far into the lake, while on the other bold rocky bluffs bound the waters, against which the mimic waves rip- ple. Occasionally a pebbly beach extends from point to point, while many little bays nestle quietly behind, jutting promontories. We coasted the lake on our raft that day, and re- turned to our shantee in the evening. We supped on venison and trout, and laid ourselves away on oui bed of boughs. V. A TBOUT-STRZAM. PARTRIDGES. THE FISHER. NAMING A A THUNDER-STORU IN THE FOREST MEACEAM'S IN the morning we started south, towards the Saranac Lakes. We left our shantee on the shore, and our catamaran in the water, for any who should come after us. Let no man who loves dry feet, em- bark on such a water craft. "While the sportsman, so far as we are concerned, is welcome to it wherever he may find it, yet we tell him frankly, that unless he builds some addition to it, he will find that, while it carries him safely, it will introduce much moisture to his boots. "We had a long journey before us this day, as our design was to reach Meacham's Lake, some sixteen miles in the wilderness. Travelling west on a town- ship line of marked trees for about three miles, we struck a blind kind of path, running south along an- 3 50 HILLS AND LAKES. other township line, which we followed until after twelve o'clock. Our stock of provisions had run low. Sea biscuit, a little salt pork, some salt, pepper and tea, was all we had left. Of venison we had none, and relying upon our daily forage for our daily food, for the first time found ourselves hungry, without flesh or fish to allay it. We had crossed no stream for miles, and regretted that we had not been more provi- dent of our commissary department, before starting in the morning. However, this we knew, that a country built like the one we were in, must ere long furnish us with a stream, and we knew, too, that we should find trout, wherever we should find water sufficient for them to swim in. We travelled on, until our ears were gladdened by the sound of' a running stream, and a beautiful stream it was too. It came laughing and dancing over rocks ; frisking around the trunks of fallen trees, and whirling away under banks, in all the wantonness of unrestrained freedom. I dropped my fly quietly by the roots of a tree that had been under- mined and fallen across the stream, when it was in- stantly seized, and a trout weighing near a quarter of a pound, was tumbling upon the bank. Another and another followed, until enough were caught foi SHOOTING PARTRIDGES. 51 our dinner. Upon gathering .them up, and turning towards the spot where I had left my guide, I saw him with my rifle in his hand, walking around, and look- "ing into the branches of a half-gr<3wn hemlock, whis- tling all the time most furiously. Presently I saw him taking aim at some object in the tree. He fired, and down tumbled a partridge. He fell to loading again, all the time whistling most vociferously. Again he fired, and again a partridge fell from among the branches. " Halloa ! old fellow," said I, " that will do. Fish and fowl will answer for a dinner for hungry men, so leave the rest, if there's more of them thera" A fire was soon struck, and in half an hour we sat down to a dinner which, with our appetites, an epicure might well envy. " Look here, Tucker," said I, while stowing awa^i a leg of partridge, "tell me why you kept up such a confounded whistling, while you were looking for those birds in the tree." "It was to keep them from flyin 7 away," he re- plied. " Off here in the woods, they ain't so shy as they are down in the settlements ; and when they take to a tree, so long as you keep up a sharp whis- 52 HILLS AND LAKES. tlin', a partridge will sit still within fifteen feet of you, You may shoot half a dozen from the same tree, pro- vided there's so many there, and you keep on whistlin'." " That's something new," said I, " and all I've got to say about it is, that if they're charmed by such music, they have a delicate ear and a singular taste." There are two things that I advise every sports- man to do, after a hearty meal in the woods, on a hot summer's day. The first is, to smoke a segar or pipe, if he has one ; and the other is, to seek some cool shade, and gather a bed of dry leaves, and spreading his handkerchief from the rim of his hat, to keep off the musquitoes and blackfly, lay himself quietly down to sleep for an hour. A longer time will debilitate, and a less time will not rest him. Ten minutes, more or less, will make no great difference; but if called upon to choose either, let him be sure to decide in favor of more. | Having dined, and enjoyed our siesta, we travelled on. We diverged from our direct route, to visit a small pond in the south-east corner of the township of Duane. This pond contains perhaps two hundred acres, and was without a name, so far as I know. Its waters are clear, and colder than those of the other A FISH HAWK. 63 lakes we had visited. A small stream enters from the north-east, about midway of the length of the lake. At the mouth of this stream, the water is deep, and a bay of some four or five rods in width by twenty in length, puts up. At the head of this bay I threw my fly. It was instantly seized by a trout weighing near half a pound. The paths along the banks show that it was a place of resort for game. There were in patches, extending from the shore in many places, grasses and pond-lilies growing in the water ; broken fragments of the latter, floating upon the surface, gave evidence that this was a rich pasture for the deer. As we sat upon the bank, a fish hawk came across the lake, and alighted upon the branch of a dry tree, leaning out from the shore, some forty or fifty rods from us. After pluming himself for a short time, he soared out over the lake, and pausing in mid air, and remaining stationary for nearly half a minute, he dropped suddenly like an arrow upon the water. In a moment he rose, with a fish of apparently a pound or more in weight, in his talons, and with his prey struggling in his grasp, flew away across the lake, and alighted upon a rock, to devour it. Having rested ourselves, we were about starting 54 HILLS AND LAKES. on our journey, when on the opposite side of the little bay we saw an animal which though not un- common in these wild regions, I had not yet seen. It is called the Fisher. Its weight may be that of a fox. Its legs are shorter than those of that animal, while its body and neck are much longer. Its form is like that of the mink. Its color is a dark brown, ap- proaching to black. He was moving cautiously along the margin of the water, stopping, from time to time, to look around him. As he passed behind a large boulder, I raised my rifle, and as he again emerged into sight, I fired at and killed him. The head of the bay was marshy, and my guide, after divesting him- self of his clothes, plunged into the water to swim across. He had not calculated upon its coldness, for as he plunged in, he sighed and blowed like a por- poise. Being a man of nerve, however, he swam over and brought the animal to our side of the bay. The fur of the Fisher is fine and valuable. Its skin is worth from three to five dollars, depending upon the season of the year in which it is taken.. We took the gentleman's hide as the spoils of war, and to pay for the trouble of shooting and skinning him. The death of this animal was the occasion of the christen- MEACHAM'S LAKE. 55 ing of this sheet of water. We hewed a smooth place on the side of an ancient birch, and with a knife carved thereon in large letters, " Fisher's Lake." Whoever shall hereafter visit it, let him respect the name we gave it and speak of it accordingly. We arrived at the margin of Meacham's Lake, an hour before sunset, wayworn and weary enough. We found here a shantee, built of poles, and more com- modious than the temporary ones we had erected. The roof was covered with bark peeled from the trees the previous year, but the sun had so dried and warped it, that it would afford small shelter from the rain, if a storm should overtake us. From present appearances, such an event was not unlikely to occur during the night. The day had been exceedingly sultry, and a bank of dense dark clouds rested on the western horizon, behind which the sun was fast sink- ing. My guide soon peeled from the trees around us, bark enough to repair the roof, and procured green boughs for our bed. I found no difficulty in procur- ing fish. I also sTiot a brace of partridges, and a small gray good rabbit ; so that we were supplied with fish, flesh, and fowl, of the freshest and most delicate kind. About ten o'clock, the bank of clouds from tho 56 HILLS AND LAKES. west had overspread the heavens. The lightning be- gan to play most vividly, illuminating both forest and lake for an instant, with perfect distinctness, and then leaving all in obscurity, impenetrable as Egyptian darkness. The deep voice of the thunder, growled and rumbled, like an earthquake, in the distance. A low mysterious moaning was heard in the forest around us, such as always precedes a storm, as if the old forest trees were whispering together, of the danger that was approaching. Louder and louder, grew the voice of the thunder. The lightning flashed and played along the surface of the lake, lighting it almost in a continuous blaze. Anon the pattering of the big drops of rain upon the forest leaves, and upon the surface of the water, was heard, and in a few minutes the storm was upon us. The rain poured in torrents ; the lightnings flashed around us, while the booming thunders echoed among the mountains. We were securely sheltered, . and there was sublimity in the warring elements around us. In an hour the storm moved on. Its roar receded into silence. The stars looked out in their brightness and the night voices were again lifted up, as if rejoicing that the tempest had passed away. VI. MORNING IN THE WOOD3. MT_GuiDE. A FlRST VlSIT TO TH CITY. A MISTAKE AND ITS CONSEQUENCES. * THE morning was the most beautiful that I ever witnessed, so clear, so cool and bright, and such freshness upon all things. The trees wore a brighter, greeoer mantle ; the little forest flowers, a richer hue. The birds sang more joyously, and even the deep voice of the frog had a note of gaiety in it, that it did not possess before. The lake was perfectly calm, not a ripple disturbed its waters, save where the trout leaped in his gleesomeness above the surface. It was a glorious sight, the rising of the sun tha.t morning ; to see him gilding with his beams the tops of the mountains, while in the valley, where that lake lay sleeping, the grayness of twilight still lingered ; to see his light chasing the shadows down the sides of the mountains ; to see his rays, resting first on the tops of 3* 58 HILLS AND LAKES. the, tall forest trees, and then peering through the opening among the foliage, throwing bright spots upon the surface of the water, and then, as he rose above the brave old trees, giving his beams to wanton on the still bosom of the lake. My guide had spent some days at this lake, during the last season, and had constructed a canoe, which we found where he had left it, hid away among some bushes that grew near the shore. It required some caulking before being launched, but by six o'clock we had breakfasted, and were on the water. This lake is some six or seven miles in circumference. On the east of it are high mountains, not disposed in ranges, but isolated, thrown in as it were by handfuls, by the great Creator. On the south, and stretching per- haps for miles, is a valley which many years hence, when the great west shall be filled up, will present beautiful farms, rich in agricultural products, and teeming with tame life. It is wild enough now. The voice of the forest birds, the song of the brook that flows along through its centre, and the sighing of the wind among the trees, are the only sounds that are heard. We pushed from the beach, and paddled leisurely along the shore, visiting its beautiful bays, and peer- MY GUIDE. 59 mg into its leafy grottoes, wliere some lovely estuary shot landward among the trees. My guide was a philosopher in his way, as well as an original. His age was about forty-eight, and hia frame was of that robust, hardy, and enduring kind, that is found mostly among the border men of our country. The refinements of society he knew nothing about. He had spent his life in the back settlements, and in the woods. He was a strong- minded man by nature, and a thoughtful one. And his solitary ramblings, his forest experience, had made him a reflecting and a wise man in his way. He had once visited the city, and been followed by the boys, and pronounced green. He took an antip- athy to paved streets, the rumbling of carriages, and the impertinence of loafers, and swears he will never go within sight or sound of a city again. He de- scribed to me his journey, and his original way of telling his adventures amused me. " I had," said he, " seen all the wonders of the woods ; I had tussled with the painters, and taken it rough and tumble with the bears; I had killed the largest catamount, and skinned the biggest buck of the Shatagee. I had slept in the woods for months. I had hunted the 60 HILLS AND LAKES. moose on snow-shoes in the winter, and been eat up by the black flies and musquitoes in the summer. So, fifteen years ago last June, I thought I'd take a trip to Albany, and dispose of my spelter, and see the sights. 1 packed up my stuff, and a good lot of it I had too. I had all I could load in a big skiff, of furs and skins, and among 'em was more'n one of the painter and bear. I started from Plattsburgh for Whitehall, and let me tell you, Squire, that's a long road on old Champlain, to travel all alone, pullin' a big skiff, and when you've tried it, you'll Believe its some. Well, after four days hard pullin', I landed at Whitehall ; there I got my stuff on board of a canal- boat, and went ahead. At West Troy I hired a canal- horse and a wagon, and started for Albany. I sold my stuff at a profit, and then I thought I'd take a look at the sights. So I went gaping about, lookin' in at the windows of the stores, and staring at the queer signs, and lookin' at the carriages and the women, in a way that was no doubt uncommon. The boys got round me, and wanted to know where I was caught, and whether my mother knew I was out. I didn't mind this much, for they were too small to get angry with, and they didn't know any better. Pretty THE WAY I LATHERED HIM WITH MY LEATHER BELT, W A6 A THING TO STAND OUT OF THE WAY OF A FIRST VISIT TO THE CITY. 61 soon a full-grown, ill-lookin' young man thought he'd take a hand at the sport, and jin'd in with the boys in poken' fun at me. He pushed the little ^ones agin me, and wanted to know how many cubs like me, the old bear had at home. I'm a patient man, Squire, but there's some things I can't stand, and bein' laffed at without occasion, is one of 'em. So I told the young feller, if he'd mind his business, I'd mind mine, and that would make it all straight and right between us ; besides, if he didn't, he'd get into a fix that wouldn't be pleasant. The chap seemed to have grit in him, and squared off for a fight, but what it was to be about, I didn't understand any more'n the man in the moon. I advised him in a good natered way, to keep on his own side of the trail, but it didn't do any good. He seemed to take it for granted I was scared, and that made him more full of fight than ever. He laid his hand on the collar of my old huntin' coat, and at a jerk tore it half off my back. Blood's blood, Squire, and mine was up. I wan't a baby then, and ain't now. That handful of bones" (said he, baring his brawny arm, and doubling his huge fist,) "hain't often been flung at a human critter, and I hope never will be again. But when it lighted on that fellow's 62 HILLS AND LAKES. face, it's my opinion tie saw stars. He went over and over, into the middle of the street, and when he went down he laid still. He hadn't any fight left in him. He got on to his feet at last, and staggered, like a drunken man. I was sorry I hit him so hard, but it's my opinion he deserved what he got. Presently a man walked up, and said I was wanted. ' Who be you,' said I. 'I'm a constable,' he replied, 'and you must go with me to the Perlice.' ' All right,' said I, ' go ahead ; law is law, and must be gin' in to.' "Well, we went to the office, and I've a notion, Squire, that Justice of the Peace was an honest man, for he didn't seem to want to take advantago of me because I didn't know the ways of the Court. The feller I struck was there, and sich a face as he carried, was a sight to see. His nose was swelled up like a great sassenger, and his eyes had a long way to look, before they could see outside of the great puff around them. Well, he was called on to swear, and the way he lied agin' me, was a sin to hear. You'd a believed from what he said, that the fault was all on my side, and that he was the innocentest lamb that had ever been worried by a wolf. I thought it all over with me, when the Squire asked me what I had to say. THE COURT OF JUSTICE. 63 "' Squire,' said I, 'I'm a peaceable rnan, and never had a quarrel with a human critter but twice be- fore, and then I couldn't help it. I never struck a man but once before, and I've been sorry ever since, I was forced to do it. I'm a stranger to the ways of the city, and may be I don't act as genteel as I ought to. I'm a man of the back settlements, and the woods. I'm an honest man, and came down on an honest callin', from the Shatagee country. I meddled with nobody, and have been as civil as I know how to be. That lyin' cuss, was for imposin' on, and abusin' me. He has told a cussed pack of lies, from one eend to the other, exceptin' a single fact, which I own up to, because it's true. I did strike him, and I was sorry that the blow was so hard, but since I've hearn him swear, I've a notion I sarved him right.' Then I told him the real truth, in a plain, straight forard way. " l Tucker,' said he, for I told him my name, ( I don't doubt your story myself, for you look and talk like an honest man, but I can't take your statement agin' the oath of the witness.' " ' Squire,' said an honest looking blue eyed boy, of abont twelve year old, that had followed us into the office, ( that man's story is every word true, for I 64 HILLS AND LAKES. seed it all myself;' and he stepped up to the book and was sworn, and told the whole story, true as gos- pel. * The case is dismissed,' said the Squire. I thanked the honest-hearted boy, that didn't like to see a wrong done, and the Squire thanked him too. Well, I harnessed up my old hoss, and started. I pulled up old Champlain for home, and when I set my foot in a city again, 'twill be after this. When I get into the woods I know all about things. I've trav- elled among 'em, and seen so many wild animals, that I know their natur'. The still lakes, that lay away off here all alone, and the streams that steal along round -X' among the rocks and hills, are like old neighbors ; I know them allj and I love them. I wonder, Squire, that more people don't, like you, come out here into the woods, and see what God made, and as he made it. Why don't they get into the deep forests, among the tall trees, the streams, the lakes and mountains, among the cool shades, to hear how cheerfully the birds sing, and what nater' says, when she talks to herself." The stories of my guide were a source of greab amusement to me. He had encountered every variety of adventure in his long experience in the woods ; twenty-five years of his life, had been spent among A BEAR AND HER CUBS. 65 the lakes and streams, in this wild country, and it may well be supposed that he had seen and experi- enced much, the recital of which, to one unused to such scenes, would afford a vast deal of interest. " You see," said he, " Squire, that big rock," pointing to a boulder on the margin of the lake, about the size of a haystack. Against it, were piled large fragments of rocks, and just in the rear of it was a space that would form a comfortable den for a bear or a wolf. " Well," said he, " I had a time of it right there, ten years ago this summer. I'd been out here huntin', and one day I was paddling along by the shore, when what should I see friskin' about on the sand there, just by that rock, but two cubs about as black as the devil, and the size of a big cat. I knew the mother wasn't a great way off, and wouldn't take it kind of me to be medlin' with her babies, but I wanted them young bars, and made up my mind to have 'em too. They didn't seem to be at all afraid, but set up on their bottoms, and looked at me as I stepped ashore, as impudently as though I warnt human. I examined my rifle, and saw 'twas all right, and seizing one in each hand, tossed them into the canoe. They set up a terrible cry for sjach small 66 HILLS AND LAKES. critters, as I knew they would, and I jumped into the canoe and shoved off. I pulled their ears, and made 'em cry out again. Presently I heard a crackling and crashing among the oushes, and a puffing and growl- ing, and I knew the old she one was coming. I was eight or ten rods from the shore, and as she came in sight, I held up one of the cubs and made it sing out. The old bar saw me, and her baby, and put into the water after me, for a fight. I let her swim to within about twenty or thirty feet of the canoe, and picked up my rifle to settle matters, and pointed it at her and pulled. The cussed thing snapped. Things began to look serious just then ; my best chance was to paddle for it, and Squire, the way I pulled for a few minutes was great I gained on the old lady, and had time to prime my rifle. This time there was no mistake. As she came within a few yards of me I put a ball through her skull, and she .turned over in the water dead. I hauled her into the canoe, and pulled back for the rock again. I wanted a crack at the father of the family, if he was about. So I waited until to- wards night. Occasionally I'd make the young ones squall, as a kind of notice to the old one, that he was "wanted. Sure enough, just before sundown, in an- THE BEAR HUNT. 67 swer to the cry of the cubs, down came the old he one, angry as anything, and full of fight as a mad dog. I pulled the ea?s of the little cub, and he cried out again, and in plunged the old fellow after me. I settled him too, with a rifle ball, and then pulled ashore for the night. I knew there were no more bars there, and the cubs and I, slept very well in the nest behind the rocks. I did a good thing that trip ; I got nine dollars apiece for the skins, and twenty dol- lars for the cubs. They were hungry enough, when I got home, but they soon got over it, and were gentle and playful as kittens. I took 'em down to Platts- burgh, and sold 'em to a man from Montreal." We landed by the rock, and he pointed out to me, the place where he had slept with his cubs. It was a proper place for the lair of bruin, and had we not al- ready a comfortable dwelling, would have made no bad resting place for us. \ II. THE DESERTED HUT. HUNTING ON THE CRUST. FOREST JXTBTICB ADMINISTERED BY A HUNTER. A CAPTIVE AND ITS RELEASE. FROM the top of this rock, we had a view of the whole lake a small pocket telescope brought every- thing close to me. We saw several deer, feeding along the margin, in different directions, and some half a mile down the lake, we saw one swimming across to the opposite shore. We saw numerous "broods of wild ducks, sporting in the water, now diving and again skimming along the surface, in play- ful gyrations round the careful mother. As we were watching one of these broods, in a little bay some fifteen rods from us, we saw them at a signal, which we heard from, the mother, dart suddenly from sight, among the flags and rushes, while she, too, hastened to conceal herself. We saw the cause of this alarm, in a large bald eagle, that came soaring majestically A SECLUDED BAY. 69 over the lake. This king of birds makes prey of the waterfowl, and here in the solitudes of the wilderuess, he is the only enemy they have to encounter. The price of their security, is unsleeping vigilance, and were one of these broods to leave the shelter of the shore, the chances of their return would be none of the surest. We passed into a little bay, that shot round and hid. as it were, behind a rocky point, to prepare dinner. This bay may have contained half m acre, and was so completely secluded, that without searching for us, hundreds may have coasted the lake, without our being discovered. "We landed, and while my guide was building a ore, I threw my fly. It was no trouble to procure a supply of fish. Among these lakes, there is no need =>f laying by a supply for the next meal. Build your fire, and five minutes will suffice to furnish the trout. We had a venison steak, stowed away among gijeen boughs at the bottom of our dug-out. We dined right sumptuously that day, and stretched ourselves for our siesta. In an hour, we shot out from the little bay, and paddled on. We caught some small fish near the shore, and moved towards the centre of the lake, to see if there were large trout in the deep water. 70 HILLS AND LAKES. The experiment was successful. I drew up three from about sixty feet down, in a few minutes. We returned to the shore, and passed on in our coasting voyage. On the north-west bank, we came to a small cleared spot, where once had stood the hut of a Cana- dian half-breed, as they are termed. It had rotted, down, many years before, and the rank grass, weeds, and bushes, occupied the spot, where imagination pictured his little garden. It was only imagination, for unless the half of an acre of potatoes and beans, may be called a garden, he never had one. The half- breed, that is half French and half Indian, is a deteri- oration of both branches of the ancestral tree. He has all the laziness of the Indian, so far as work is concerned, with none of his industry, ingenuity, and perseverance in the chase. He lives by fishing, trap- ping, and basket-making. The muskrat and mink, and the skins of the deer, taken on the crust, furnish + him with a scanty supply of clothing, groceries, and breadstuffs. He spends his summers and sometimes his winters, by these lakes in the deep forest. Three or four times a year, he shoulders a pack of furs, and with his wife and children, goes out to the settlements, to dispose of his wares, and procure such articles as go A CANADIAN HALF-BKEED. 71 to make up his absolute necessaries. He encamps on the borders of civilization, for a few weeks, making and peddling baskets, and then puts back to his cabin by the lakes. He has two or three dogs, with which he drives the deer into the lakes, and catches them with his canoe in the summer, and with which he destroys them on the crust in the winter, a manner of taking them which every true hunter holds in pro- found abhorrence. He is a stupid, lazy, shiftless specimen of humanity, without skill or sagacity in any department of a woodman's life. " Squire," said my guide, as we approached the spot where the cabin of the half-breed once stood, "the fellow that owned this- clearin' has been gone a great many years, and it was a drubbin' I gave him that scared him away. He was meaner'n pusley, and the way I made him understand my feelins' in regard to him, was this: I and old Pete Meigs" (of whom more hereafter) " had been down by the Saranac Lakes, beatin' up a moose pen. "We got four moose that time, which is more'n was got at any one time, by any hunters ever I hearn tell on. Well, we were travellin' home on our snow-shoes. This pond lay in our way, and we crossed it down by where our shan- 72 HILLS AND LAKES. tee now stands. We had a shantee there then, and we calculated to put up there for the night. There had been a bit of a thaw, and it had rained the day before, but the wind chopped round to the north, and froze everything as tight as beeswax. The crust was sharp as a knife, and would almost bear a man. We got to our shantee, and started a fire, when what should we hear but the dogs of that blasted half-breed, yelping like death, in pursuit of something. On they came, right by the shantee, with a big buck close be- fore them. It had been a tough winter in the woods, and the poor beast was nothing but skin and bones. Every leap he took was marked by his blood, as the sharp crust tore the flesh on his legs. I was mad enough to see *it, I tell you. Well, just by the edge of the lake, the dogs pulled down and throttled the poor critter. I knew very well who they belonged to, and I'd a great mind to give 'em a taste of my rifle ; but then I remembered 'twas their nater, and they wan't to blame. So I waited, and when the dogs had killed the deer, they sat down beside it, and began to howl, as if callin' their master to come and finish their dirty work. Sure enough, in a little while, along came the cussed half-breed on his snow-shoes, and fell 1' HE CANADIAN'S EXIT. 73 to skinnin' the deer. He was a miserable, stunted critter, too lazy to carry a gun, and wouldn't know how to use it if he had one. He was hunting the deer merely for their skins, and was killin' about a dozen a day on the crust. Everything about them critters is mongrel. He's a half-breed, and his wife's a half- breed; his children, if he has any, are half-breed. His dogs are half-breed. Whatever he has about him. is half-and-half. He's only half civilized, and when he was made up, there was at least one Ingen and one white man spiled. " Well, I took the 'sneakin' cuss by the neck, and the way I lathered him with my leather belt, was a thing to stand out of the way of. He yelled louder'n his hounds could bay. I gave him a hoist in the stern with my boot, that sent him about a dozen yards into a snow drift. 'There,' said I, 'you copper-colored cross between an Ingin and a French gander, be off to your shantee, and if your dogs bark again in these woods this winter, I'll stick you through an air-hole in the lake. I give you till next June, to get out of the Shatagee woods. I shall be round these parts, and if I find you here after that, you're a gone sucker.* The darned fool was so frightened, that he turned pa^e 4 74 HILLS AND LAKES. as a skewer, and believed every word I said was gos- pel. I hunted out this way the next season, in July, and sure enough the half-breed was gone ; wife, babies, and dogs, all had cut stick, for fear I should eat him without salt. Old Pete Meigs and I bunked in his cabin many a trip after that ; but it rotted down at last, and you see the weeds and bushes have taken possession of his potatoe patch. " I've often thought," continued my guide, " that man is naterally a beast of prey, bent by nater on fightin' with his fellow man, leastwise he is ready to do so, on slight occasion. Now, I all'ers felt like pitchin' into a half-breed, or a regular Ingin, when- ever I met them, more especially the half-breed ; and I do believe I could strangle one, on a less occasion than that of savin' my own life. I was bro't up in a human way, and was made to believe that fightin' and quarrellin', and especially killin' human things, was agin nater, and therefore I never harmed any of 'em, but that one sneakin' cuss. But I all'ers felt 'twould be human nater to larrup 'em wherever I met 'em, and 'twas only because I'd been taught better, that I didn't do it. Edication is a great check on the nater of man. It's* that that makes him better'n a half-breed, CATCHING A FAWN. 75 and better'n a regular Ingin too; and its that that keeps his hands off of anybody he don't like," We spent the day in coasting this lake. We found abundant evidence that it was much frequented by the deer, in the night season. Indeed, as I stated before, we saw them even in the day-time feeding along the margin of the lake. As we rounded a wooded point, that extended some distance into the lake, we came upon a doe and two fawns, swimming in a little bay, into which we suddenly entered. By a vigorous pull we got between one of them and the shore. Terror was stronger in the mother than the love for her off- spring, and she bounded away into the forest, leaving them to shift for themselves. I said we cut off one of the fawns from the shore : after various turnings and windings, we succeeded in catching the little fellow, and taking him into our canoe. He was horribly frightened at first, and bleated and struggled desper- ately to get away ; but after a little, finding itself un- hurt, and that it could not escape, it seemed to resign itself to its fate ; its terror abated, and it lay quietly in my arms. After patting and fondling it in a soothing way, I sat it down loose between my feet in the bot- tom of the canoe. It made no further effort at escape, 76 HILLS AND LAKES. but looking List up at me, and then at the shore, it bleated plaintively, as if calling its mother to come back. It permitted me to pat it gently, and seemed quieted as I stroked the soft smooth hair on its head. I verily believe that if I had had the means of feeding it, I could so have tamed it in an hour, that it would have followed me like a dog. But to have taken it away, would have been cruel, as it would only have starved in our company. We judged it to have been three or four weeks old, and it was exceedingly fat and strong. We put it unharmed on the shore, and when its "feet was on its native heath," it bounded leisurely away into the forest. We heard it bleat sev- eral times, and thought at last that we heard a distant answer, after which all was still. We procured dry bark and splinters of fatwood, preparatory to going out among the deer in the night. I have stated in a previous chapter, the manner of hunting deer by torch-light. -We found them in abundance along the margin of the lake, but we did no more than frighten them. We still had a supply of venison, and after enjoying ourselves at their expense for a couple of hours, returned to our shantee to sleep. VIII. ROUND THE HUDSON. THE PANTHER AND fIB COB8. FOREST COOKERY. WE rose before the sun. The morning was calm and pleasant. A gray mist, thin and transparent, hung over the lake and crept slowly up the side' of the hill. A loon was pluming himself a few rods from the shore, and at intervals, lifting up his clarion voice, that echoed like a bugle among the mountains. We bathed and breakfasted, and once more embarked for a cruise round the lake. " Pete Meigs," said Tucker, as we paddled leisurely along, " was some in his day. He was an old man in years, five and twenty year ago, but he was a wood man to- the last. He killed a ten pronger, a fortnight afore he died, and shot him through the head at twenty rod. He dried up like a mullen stalk, and without the aid of a doctor. I helped to bu r v 78 HILLS AND LAKES. him under a gre&t-'maple, on the banks of the Shata gee, and the only land I ever paid for, is four rods square around his grave, I gave a ten dollar bear skin for that, and I've told my children to see that the old maple remains undisturbed, over the old man's resting place. I buried him seven years ago, and when the summer comes, I miss my old comrade of the woods. It's lonesome on the hills now. I miss the old man's huntin' stories and his knowin' ways. I can't go alone after the moose in the winter, and somehow I don't fancy huntin' them with anybody else. He knowed all about the critters. Huntin' them came kind a nateral to him, and I used to think he could smell a moose, as far as the critter could .smell him." "It was curious," continued he, "how old Pete and I took to one another, and while he was old enough to be my grandfather, he always wanted me along, when he took to the woods. I mind once we was down the Hudson, below the falls, where they take people across the river in a boat. We had'nt sixpence between us, and the ferryman would'nt carry us over short of a shillin'. We had our rifles, new ones they were too. Our business down, had been to buy 'em at Saratoga, and that's what had taken (jOING ROUND THE HUDSON. 79 our money. We had all the fixens, and were put- ting out for the Shatagee. ' Joe/ said old Pete, to me, ' let's go round the darned river, and cheat the blasted Ingen out of his shillinV ' Agreed,' says I, and the ferryman grinned when he saw us move up stream. We started for the sources of the Hudson, and we went round the river. We were five weeks away up among the Adirondack mountains. That's a wild country for you, Squire. If you want to see mountains piled up, and valleys scooped out, and lakes, and ponds, and streams, and trout, and deer, and bear, and a sprinklin' of painters, and catamounts, do as old Pete Meigs and I did go round the Hudson. " I mind one day we came to an old baldheaded mountain, standing all alone by itself, liftin' its top high above the clouds, and defyin' the storms that beat against its rugged sides. Old Pete proposed, that he go round it one way, and I the other, and meet on the opposite side. It warn't like going round a haystack, 'Squire, you may believe. It was five good miles around, and a smart chance of breaking your neck in the bargain, over the loose rocks that had tumbled down the side of the mountain. Well, I had 80 HILLS AND LAKES. travelled for an hour, round the base of the hill, when I came to the edge of a ravine, across which my way lay. It was a deep gully worn down by a stream, when the freshets swelled it into a torrent ; on each side of it, at the place where I stood, were perpen- dicular rocks from twenty to sixty feet high. This made me alter my course, and go either above or be- low, in order to cross over. As I stood leaning against a great pine, I heard a growl in' and snarlin' sort of a noise, and lookin' across the gulf, I saw on the opposite side, two painters busy in devourin' the carcass of a deer they had caught. It was, may be, twenty rods in a straight line, from where I stood, to the place where they were at work. Now painters are like cats in their nater, and manner of feedin'. They had each torn off a limb of the deer, and lay stretched out on their bellies, eatin' and growlin', net with anger as it seemed to me, but with satisfaction at havin' a pleasant breakfast. I drew up by the side of the old pine, and sighted carefully at the head of one of the kritters and pulled away. I made a good sh'ot that time, for the ball went right through his brain. He made a convulsive spring, and rolled over, and over, kiokin' and tearin' the earth, till he tumbled THE PANTHERS. 81 down the rocks some fifty feet into the gulf be >w, As I fired, I stepped behind the tree again to load I warn't an hour-loadin' that time, 'Squire, as you 3 lay guess, and I warn't in such a hurry as not to do it sure, either. "Well, I peaked out from behind my tree, and there was the other varmint, walkin' and lookin' around mighty oneasy like. He didn't seem to un- derstand the matter at all. He hadn't discovered me, and it seemed as though he was astonished at the conduct of his mate. He would snuff the ground, and creep carefully down to the edge of the precipice, and look over, as if wondering what had possessed the other to plunge into such an infernal hole. He was evidently displeased with such conduct. The hair on his back was up, like that of an angry dog, and I wasn't- sorry that he did'nt see me, and that there was a gulf between us. After walkin' round, and lashing himself with his long tail, he set down on his haunches, and looked towards where I was standing. His breast was towards me, and I sighted him b/ the side of the tree long and sure, and pulled. You ought to have seen the bound he made, 'Squire. He was twenty good feet above the brink of the precipice, and I'm blamed if he didn't clear it, and go over and 82 HILLS AND LAKES. over, down into the gulf, and I heard him strike the bottom, as plain as I heard the crack of my own rifle. " My two shots were answered by old Pete Meigs ? s rifle, and I fired again as a signal, and waited for the old man to come round. Presently I heard his halloa below me, and I went to meet him. He'd hardly be- lieve my story, but we went up the gulf, and found my two painters shot dead enough, and their bones broken by their plunge down the rocks, in the bar- gain. One of them was a she one, and from appear- ance 3 was the mother of a family, Old Pete declared he'd have her whelps. We vent round to where I fourd them eatin' the deer, and the old man, after examinin' the signs, as he termed them, started off to- ward the head of the gulf. We searched the rest of that day, but found nothing. We were satisfied, however, that we war'nt a great ways from the old painter's lair, for we found, scattered about, the bones of deer, and other animals they had devoured. We camped on the mountains that night, and about day- light, old Pete started from his bed of boughs, and cocking his ear for a moment, cried out, * that's them.' I listened, and heard a whinin', moanin' sort of a noise, like a kitten's that's lost its mother. We started THE PANTHER'S CUBS. 83 off in the direction of the sonnd, and at the head of the gulf, under a ledge of rocks, we found three young painters, nestling in a bed of leaves, snug enough. They were about as large as cats, and plump, and fat, and hungry as anything. One of 'em we knocked on the head, and each of us took another, and went ahead. We fed 'em on fresh meat, and bro't 'em out safe. We sold them to a menagery man for twenty- five dollars a piece. They were harmless, playful things, and one would hardly think they'd grow up to be such fierce and ugly customers. Old Pete Meigs and I made fifty dollars a piece that trip round the Hudson, and had a good time of it too." On the west side of the lake, some distance below our shantee, the water was shallow for a few acres. Here the pond-lilies grew in profusion, covering the surface with their broad, round leaves, in the midst of which sparkled, like silver, a thousand beautiful white flowers. These lily patches furnish rich pasture for the deer, and we noticed paths leading into the forest, which were trampled almost like those leading to a sheepfold. It being towards night, we sat ourselves quietly down behind a thick clump of bushes, on a low promontory, to watch for the deer as they should 84 HILLS AND LAKES. come to the water to feed. We were careful to select a spot for our hiding-place, so situated that the breeze would blow towards us, from the direction in which we supposed they would enter the water to feed. This is necessary, as the deer will otherwise scent the hunter a long distance, and. keep beyond the* reach of his rifle. We sat silent for perhaps half an hour, watching, when an old buck walked cautiously from the forest, and stepped into the edge of the lake. Here he paused, and looked in every direction about him, and seeing that all was safe, waded out three or four rods from the shore, and commenced feeding on the stems of the pond-lilies. He was within fair range of my rifle, but we let him feed on. Presently a doe came down from the woods, in the same cautious man- ner, and she, too, began to regale upon the rich pas- ture that the lake afforded. We sat there until four were quietly feeding, all in fair sight, and within range of my rifle. Selecting a small on that, from where I sat, seemed to be in the best case, I fired and brought him down. The report of my rifle and the smoke frightened the others hugely, and with a snort they leaped from the water, and went crashing and whistling up the mountains. The old buck didn't FOREST COOKERY. 85 seem to understand the matter at all. He was greatly alarmed, to be sure, but we heard him whistling every few minutes, and beating the ground with his feet, as if bounding up and down, some forty or fifty rods away in the forest, for a long time. He was shut out from our view, as we were from his, by the dense foliage between us. At last we heard him bound away in earnest, and all was still again. Our deer was a small two year old, and exceedingly fat and tender. We supped on his sirloin, roasted before the fire that night, and that with a relish seldom equalled. The science of roasting a sirloin of venison in the woods, is not to be despised. One must understand it to succeed well. Two crotched sticks are set up be- fore, and at a proper distance from the fire, and from each other ; across these in the fork, and at the height of about six feet, is laid another. The venison is sus- pended from this cross-bar by a string, close enough to the*fire to roast, and is kept coii^rntly turning, so that all sides get an equal portion of the heat. We used a pint basin for a dripping-pan, from which, ever and anon, we basted it with the rich gravy that dripped from it while roasting. Birch bark, just peeled from the trees, served for platters and plates 86 HILLS AND LAKES. when it was done ; and let me say to you, that our venison tasted to us better that night than though it had been dealt with in the most artistic style of cook- ery, and spoiled by a profusion of French condiments. IX. THE LOST CHILD SHAOK. "WHAT a queer matter it is, Squire," said Tucker, as he knocked the ashes from his pipe, after supper, by tapping the inverted bowl against his left thumb- nail, "that all living things should stand in fear of a man. From the fierce painter to the timid hare ; from the eagle, that looks with a steady eye at the sun, as he soars beyond sight into the sky, to the sparrow that chirrups in the hedge ; all 'flee from the face of a man, and that, too, though they never saw one of his kind afore. Some animals, to be sure, when they be- come better acquainted with him,' learn to fear him less, and live in his neighborhood with less of dread ; but such animals are his slaves, servin' him with patient and slavish fear. Among all the dumb beasts, the dog alone seems to live on friendly terms with him. Now, Squire, tell me why it is that all livin' 88 HILLS AND LAKES. things, save the dog alone, seems to regard man as their nateral enemy. The little trout, even, that suns himself in the ripple, darts away from his presence, and. hides himself under the bank. Is it because he is always warring against 'em? Killing 'em for his pleasure, or enslaving 'em for his profit? I all'ers tho't that the love of unrestrained freedom, was a nateral element in all livin' things, strong as life it- self. The moose scents a man afar off, and hides him* self away in the deepest recesses of the forest, or the darkest shadows of the swamps. The painter, unless made bold by hunger, lays silent and still in his lair to escape him. The bird takes to his wings, and flies away from him. Among all the wild or tame ani- mals, the dog alone seems to regard him as a friend and protector, and stays willingly by him, as a con fidin' and faithful servant, watchin' over his safety, and lookin' to him for protection. By the way, Squire, the dog is an animal that a man may take profitable lessons of. He never deceives his friend and master. He never ceases to love him ; when all other friends forsake and flee from him, he stands by him. In hunger and cokl, in sickness and distress, he never leaves him. All he asks is food, and even that isn't MY GUIDE'S DOG. 89 made a condition of his servitude or friendship. I love my dog," said he, as he put his brawny arm around his shaggy friend's neck, and drew him to- wards his bosom, and I could see by the sparkling eyes of the animal, as he licked his master's face, that the love was reciprocal. It may not be amiss to introduce to the reader, the friend that held so high a place in my guide's regards. That I have not done so before, is perhaps blameable. He started with us into the wood, glad enough, as it seemed to me, for the privilege of doing so. He was a large, powerful animal, of no particular breed or beauty. His coat was shaggy, and of light gray color. The blood of the terrier, the stag-hound, the New- foundland, and cur, evidently mingled in his veins ; and it may well be that the mastiff and stubbornly - courageous bull -dog might have been reckoned among his ancestors. He had a large head, and two of the most active, intelligent eyes that I ever happened to see belonging to a dumb animal. He had, from accident or design, been shorn of his tail, excepting a short stump of about six inches. His ears, too had been trimmed, as my guide said, when he was a pup, to make him look sharp and active. His looks did 90 HILLS AND LAKES. not belie his character for courage or intelligence. When we desired it, he went with us, close at his master's heels when we travelled, or sitting quietly in the bow of our canoe, or on our raft, when we floated on the water. When we did not desire his company, we left him at our shantee, placing him as a watch- man over some garment that we would leave in his charge. Where we thus left him, we were sure to find him on our return. He would greet us as we came back, rejoiced to see us, and would say as plainly as a speechless animal could say, that he had been a faithful watcher in our absence. "That dog," resumed my guide, " has knowin' ways, and I sometimes imagine that he thinks like a man. That -he has strong memory I know, and that he some- times gets at the meaning of things in a human way, I do believe. Two years ago this summer, my little girl went into the edge of the woods one day, to pick berries. You know our little clearin' is mostly sur- rounded with woods, and on two sides the forest stretches away for fifty miles or more. The time for her return passed away, and she didn't come back. Her mother and me became alarmed ; we went all round the edge of the woods, and called, and called THE LOST CHILD. 91 but no answer was returned. Then we knew she was lost ; and, Squire, you never can know the bitterness of the thoughts that come into a parent's heart, when he knows that his little one is away off, lost, all alone, wandering in the wild woods to starve, and die, or be torn in pieces, and devoured by the beasts of prey. My boy was away to the mill, and Shack (the name of his dog) was with him. The sun was going down behind the mountains, and no tidings of our little one reached us. My wife's heart was broken with fear for her poor girl ; and although a strong woman, her nerves were all gone with anguish. I carried her to the house and left her in charge of my boy, who had just returned. I shouldered my rifle, and calling Shack after me, went out to pursue the search. I called, and called, but could hear no an- swer. Presently Shack seemed to understand some- thing of the trouble I was in, and though I never knew him to leave my heels or disobey me before, he became terrible uneasy like, starting away every few minutes, and returning with the greatest reluctance. Now it never occurred to me that Shack, after all, was the best searcher for the lost one. I was so troubled, that I forgot the noble instinct and sagacity of the 92 HILLS AND LAKES. dog. At last, when I called the name of my girl, Shack, as if he'd made up his mind, darted away, and utterly refused to come back, gis ways was strange to me, and I was kind o' scared by his be- havior. He coursed in a circle, growing wider and wider, running at the top of his speed, with his head down, as. if in pursuit of something, till I lost sight and hearing of him, and like rny little girl, I was alone in the forest. The dark night had come on, but 1 struggled forward, stumbling at every foot fall in the darkness, calling every few minutes, my daugh- ter's name. The echoes of my voice died away into stilness, or was answered only by the startled cry of some night bird. -" I sat down to rest, and concluded in my hope- lessness to wait for the daylight, to pursue the search. It was a sad, sad thing, Squire, to sit there* in the silent darkness, and know that my little girl too, way alone in those dark wide woods, shiverino- with fear, ' O / and calling upon her father to carry her home see- ing, in her terror, great round eyes of wild beasts, glaring upon her from every bush, and hearing their angry growl in every forest sound. I heard the solemn hooting of the owl. and his wild scream, and THE SEAECH. 98 thought what terror it would carry to her little heart. I heard the dull creaking of some great tree, as it rubbed against another, and while to me it was a fa- miliar sound, yet how full of horror it would be to her ears. She was a timid, tender thing, and I thougtd all these sounds, and the darkness would kill her- I sat there may be an hour, when I heard a crashing of the brush on the way I had come, and in a moment Shack bounded up to me. He was panting and lolling, as if he was just from a long chase, but he seemed overjoyed and crazy as a loon. He bounded around me, and jumped upon me, and whined and barked in a way that I had never seen a dog do be- fore ; and it seemed out of place that he should be so merry, when my own heart was so sad. He would jump upon me, and bound away, and then stop and look back, as if asking me to follow him. Scolding did no good, he would not heed it. All at once, light broke in upon me. He has found my child, I cried, and is telling me to go to her. I wasn't long in obey- ing him, you may be sure, Squire ; and when I start- ed in the direction he indicated, he became at once quiet, and steady before me, as if satisfied that he was understood. We had travelled thus what seemed to 94 HILLS AND LAKES. me a long distance, when a thought seemed to strike him. He stopped and listened a moment, and then dashed like a race-horse away. Calling did no good : he was ought of sight in a moment, and in less than a minute I lost the sound of his bounds, as he dashed through the woods. I followed in the direction as fast as the darkness would permit. It was some fif- teen minutes, when I again heard him coming at full speed to meet me. He seemed as joyous as before, and after jumping and barking for a moment around me, took his post in front again, and we passed on. After awhile, I called out my little one's name, and, Oh ! it was a sweet and pleasant answer to my heart, that came faintly back, ' father, I am here.' Away bounded Shack again, and you may believe, Squire, that I wasn't long in following him. A few minutes, and my little one was in a happy man's arms, safe from harm, but trembling with the horror of her night in the dark still woods. " She had wandered in search of berries, beyond the sight of our clearing, and when she turned to go home, became bewildered and lost in the mazes of the forest. She wandered on until night, and then, in mortal terror, sat down in the darkness to weep, and, THE CHILD FOUND. 95 as she thought, to die. Frightened as she was, sleep weighed down her little eyelids, and she slept. She was awakened, she said, by something licking her little bare feet and face, and she -started up screaming in affright, thinking it was a panther or a bear ; but Shack leaped, and whined, and yelped in his great gladness around her ; and when she knew it was him, she felt safe. He stayed by her a few minutes, and then darted away, and she was alone again, and as frightened as ever. She dared not call, for fear the panthers and bears would hear her, and come and tear her to pieces. She had sat there a long time, when something stirred among the bushes near her, and she screamed out in her terror. It must have been that Shack heard her, as he was guiding me forward at the time he left me, though the sound didn't reach my own ear. A few minutes after, Shack was by her side again, glad enough to find her safe. He soon left her, and when she heard my voice, she knew he was lead- ing me to her. We were two good miles in the woods then, but, Squire, that little girl that I loved so dearly, that had been lost in them great wide woods, and been found again, was light as my own heart, as I bore her 96 HILLS AND LAKES; Lome, and placed her in the arms of her mother ; and you needn't wonder that we've loved Shack more'n ever, since that sorrowful night." There's a beauty in the deep forest of a moonlight night, that we of the city but faintly dream of. Our shantee was on the banks, a few rods from the lake, with a slope of green between it and the water. Above us the trees, stretching out their long arms, formed an arch, through the vacant spaces of which, the stars peered down, while before us we looked away over the bright waters, on which the moon- beams played, as the night-breeze sent the mimic waves, rippling in tiny billows, over its bright surface. Ever and anon was heard the splash of the trout, as he leaped from the depths, and the deer, as he waded from the shore, to feed on the aquatic pastures, and the frog, as he leaped from his rock, and sending forth a sharp quick note, plunged into the lake, to hide himself beneath the weeds and water-plants. Beyond and across the lake, the bare head of a conic mountain shot skyward, throwing back the moonlight from his glistening brow, while the night-winds sighed and moaned among the old forest trees that clustered SLEEP. 97 around his base. The night was too beautiful almost for sleep. Yet we laid ourselves down upon our bed of boughs ; slumber soon stole over us, and we passed away in the land of dreams. & X. DRBA.MI. THE PRAIRIES ON FIRE. A WOOD-DEMON s TOHOB DEEAMS ! "What are dreams ? Why is it that, & the silence or stillness of night, when the body lies in- sensible in the repose of sleep, that strange visions rise up before us, and we seem to wander amid scenes that belong not to the living world, visions that war with natural laws, and yet seem, to our senses, consistent as those of real life ? A new world opens before us, a world governed by different laws ; we possess natures, antagonist to our real ones, and are endowed with attributes that belong not to humanity. We take to ourselves wings, and fly like birds through the air ; we rush unharmed through the deep waters, and plunge unhurt down profound precipices ; we talk with dumb animals, and hold communion with those who have long been slumbering in the grave. And DREAMS. 99 yet in all this there seems to us at the time, to be no violation of natural laws, nothing strange or mysteri- ous. We recall them to our waking memory, and wonder how it could be, that even in sleep, we did not detect their impossibility. Why, and how is this? Does the spirit leave for a time its prison-house, and wander, in fact, in a new and real world ? Are the things we dream of, sober realities, existent as those we see while in our waking hours ? Are there many worlds, oae within or around another, between which the spirit and the body vascillate ? When the body sinks to slumber, does the spirit, in truth, visit other worlds, participating in their scenes, mingling with other beings, and holding converse with other intel- ligences ? Who can tell ? As I slumbered upon that bed of boughs that night, strange visions passed before me. I was away in a new world, and yet all that I saw was familiar ; nothing seemed strange to me. I was among beings that I seemed to know ; not men and women, but rather the spirits of men and women ; not as those that had died, and whose bodies were mouldering in the grave, they had form, but not substance ; shadows that moved and spoke ; that seemed formed 100 BILLS AND LAKES. after the similitude of men and women, but through whose forms the sunlight passed. I possessed all the attributes of humanity, save a real, tangible body. Hands, and limbs, and body, I seemed to possess, palpable to the vision, but not to the touch. Hunger> and cold, and heat, and pain, were things that seemed to me unknown. Space and time were as nothing. I passed at once without effort, like thought, from place to place. We think of scenes far distant from us ; memory calls up the stream, the lake, the meadow, the great trees, the cottage, and the garden ; we say thought wanders away to such scenes. Well, this seemed to be with me a reality. If I thought of a scene, a locality, hundreds or thousands of miles away, at once I was there. I thought of Rome, of the great St. Peter's, and there I stood, beneath that gigantic temple. I thought of the pyramids, and stood at their base, and talked familiar with the mummies that slept within those granite piles ; I thought of Waterloo, and there I stood, surveying that mighty conflict. I saw legions of men, hurled against legions of men. I heard the roar of the cannon, and the rattle of musketry. I saw the smoke of battle, wreathing up from blazing bat DREAMS. 101 talions. I saw the flashing of swords, as vast squad- rons of horsemen mowed down the flying foe. I heard the groans of the wounded, and the wild shrieks of the dying. I passed unharmed through the con- flicting hosts, looking upon the dying and the dead. "Wherever I chose to be, at once I was there. How I passed I know not,' the fact alone I remember. As my body was intangible, it was unaffected by the ele- ments. Fire would not burn it; water would not drown it. I could walk on the bottom of the ocean, with a thousand fathoms of water above me. I could plunge into the volcano's seething cauldron. Eocks would not crush me, and precipices, down which I plunged, were harmless as the level plain. Such a being was I, and such were those around me. Shad- ows, mere intellectualities, existing palpably to the vision, having form and comeliness, but unfettered and unconfined by a fleshly body. Of such a body, it seemed to me, I had never heard, save in the wild theories of some metaphysical dreamer. Its existence was a subject of derision, and those who upheld its reality were regarded as idle visionaries, nay, as pro- fane rejectors of philosophical truths. * A change came o'er the spirit of my dream." 102 HILLS AND LAKES. I was away in the midst of the broad prairies of the West. They lay there, as they came from the Creator's hand. The eye of civilization had never be- fore looked upon them, and no civilized man had set his foot upon the green grass that vegetated upon their bosom. All around me were vast plains, tree- less and shrubless as a shorn meadow. Away off, on the one hand, hanging like a blue dim "shadow upon the horizon, was a belt that I knew to be tim- ber, while on the other, on the very outside boundary of vision, loomed up the lofty peaks of the Eocky Mountains, moveless and fixed, like sentinels of God, watching the boundless plains beneath them. The tall grass waved, like vast fields of grain in the summer winds; rich flowers of the most gorgeous hues, sent their wild fragrance abroad on the air, charming the vision J>y their glory, and entrancing the senses by their sweetness. In all this vast plain, I saw no living thing. All around me was silence ; vegetation alone seemed to live there, and that grew and flourished in richest and wildest luxuriance. It was like a vast garden, planted and nourished by the hand of nature, unaided, as it was unchecked, by the ingenuity or the industry of man. Suddenly a blight THE STAMPEDE. 103 seemed to pass over that vast plain ; the flowers faded ; the tall grass shrivelled and died ; the leaves on the rank weeds rolled together, and were blown away, by hot winds that swept over that ocean of land ; vegetation withered into a gray and sapless mass, standing where it grew ; the streams, that were wont to move in sluggish and tortuous windings, were dried up, leaving channels like the trails of immense serpents ; the, blight of drought was upon all nature about me. As I stood, wrapped in contemplation of the im- mensity around me, a dull heavy sound fell upon my ear, like the rumbling of a thousand carriages over the rough pavements of a far-off city. Turning in the direction whence the sound seemed to come, I saw in the distance vast herds of deer and antelopes, flying at wild speed towards the spot where I stood. Behind these came an army of elks, their stately horns glanc- ing and waving in the sunlight, seemed like a forest of dead, low, barkless trees. Behind these came thun- dering down again, millions and millions of buffaloes, making the earth tremble with the weight of their rushing and countless hosts. For miles and miles, in width as well as in depth, this vast herd covered the 104 HILLS AND LAKES. plain, bellowing and roaring in seeming terror at some terrible destruction behind them. Then came vast droves of wolves, panting and howling, in immense numbers, with jaws distended, and tongues lolling out, like hounds wearied by the chase. JSTone seemed seeking for prey ; a mortal terror was upon all ; all were fleeing, as it seemed for life, towards the belt of timber land visible in the distance. These vast waves of animal life swept by me ; the roar of their countless voices died away, like the tempest in its onward flight. Then I saw the reason of their mortal terror. Away in the distance, was a dense line of dark murky smoke, wreathing and twisting heavenward, wrapping earth and sky in its sombre folds. On came the fearful visitation, preceded by a line of fire athwart the whole of that vast plain, flashing and glancing upward tis new fuel was grasped by its devouring tongue, and it was hurled onward by the rushing winds. On it came, crackling and roaring, like a mighty tallow of flame, devouring and overwhelming all things in its terrible career. Onward and onward it came, with the speed of the war horse, and the roar of the tor* nado. Before, it was destruction ; in its rear, the blackness of desolation. Far as the eye could reach, THE PRAIRIE ON FIRE. 105 on the right hand and on the left, it moved in a line of fire, leaving no escape save an onward flight. I stood spell-bound as it approached ; that mighty prairie seemed rolled up, as it swept along, like a vast scroll, while the impenetrable obscurity behind it was like the darkness that was of old on the face of the deep. It approached it surrounded- it enveloped me within its folds, when 1 awoke, and behold it was & dream I and "yet not all a dream." The fire we had kindled in front of our shantee, had crept along the dry leaves until it reached the foot of 8, dead fir tree, among whose thick and withered branches, a wild grape-vine had spread its thousand tendrils. That too was dead; the fire had crept up the dry trunk of that dead fir tree, and having reached the net- work of vines and sapless branches, it burst out into a brilliant flame. When I started from my sleep it was flashing and creaking, and swirling upwards, lighting up forest and lake, like a vast torch in the hand of some gigantic demon of the woods. XI. BT Rjseis LAKE. THE BALD EAGLE His HABICS. A PKIZ*. THE morning broke clear and bright. A bath in the ctear cold waters of the lake, and a breakfast be- fore sunrise, nerved us for our day's journey towards the Saranac Lakes, some twenty miles distant. It was by no means our intention to travel all that distance in a single day ; that, would be to turn pleasure into toil. I started from home, with a determination to take things easy, and though prepared for some labor, was by no means prepared make- that labor over se- vere. As I have before stated, my guide was familiar with all this wild region, and there was no danger of becoming bewildered ; besides, the country is every- where intersected with streams, and should one be- come " lost in the woods," it would only be necessary to follow one of them and he would be sure to come TKAVELLING. 107 out ere long, at some lake which he would recognize, or if not, he would arrive at last, at some settlement The way might be longer or shorter, according to cir- cumstances, but he would find no lack of food, always supposing that he carried a rifle, and was in possession of a hook and line. We followed the course of a stream, which formed the inlet to Meacham's Lake, for some five or six miles, until we struck a township line of marked trees, and then, diverging from our course for near a mile, came to a neat little lake, covering, perhaps, two or three hundred acres. Here we bivouacked for the remainder of the day and night. Having erected our shantee, we lay down to rest. In an hour we were up again, refreshed, and ready for such amusement as the water and woods afforded. Our stock of pro- visions had become reduced to very simple fare. Sea biscuit, pepper,, salt, and a little tea, constituted oui whole supply. But these, with venison .and trout, and such appetites as a man finds in the woods, an- swers the purpose of more delicate food to a dainty taste. We constructed a catamaran of poles, and during the afternoon, coasted, and crossed the lake, found, that like the others we had visited, it 108 SILLS AND LAKES. abounded in trout large ones in the deep water, and the smaller speckled trout, near the shore. The deer, too, from the paths leading into the forest, seemed to be plenty, and at sundown I shot a small one, as he was feeding on the water-lilies near the shore. In the morning, we passed on to a pond or lake, six or seven miles distant, and near the centre of the township. This lake is some three miles in length, and varying from half a mile to a mile in width. It bore the same general aspect as the other, surrounded by old primeval forests, overlooked on one side by high hills, and skirted on the other by a valley that stretched away to the east, through which flowed a noisy brook, literally swarming with small speckled trout. We dined on sea-biscuit and broiled trout, on the banks of this pond, and then struck for St. liegia Lake, some six miles distant, and on the other side from us a range of high hills. It was a warm day, and that six miles was toilsome enough. They cost us much labor, and not a little perspiration, but by six o'clock we descended the hills, where at their base, in the deep shadows of the mountains, lay the lake, calm and still, and transparent as a mirror. It was o welcome sight to our eves, that beautiful lake, sleep ST. KEGIS LAKE. 109 ing there, so silent and alone. We had travelled some twelve miles that day, over a country rough, and toilsome at best, but rendered doubly so, by the tangled brush, the fallen trees, gullies, and broken rocks, and boulders, which lay in our way. We erected a shantee, and supped heartily on partridge and trout. We retired early that night, and, despite the sharp sting of musquitos, and their ceaseless trumpeting, slept soundly and calmly till dawn. Here again, my guide had, in former years, con- structed a canoe, which we found, where he had hid it the previous year, and having caulked, we launched it on the still surface of the waters. The St. Kegis may be four or five miles in length, by a half a mile or more in width, bending around the bluff end of a hill, somewhat in the shape, though less curved than a horse-shoe. On the opposite shore the land is more level, and the shallows reach far out into the lake. On these shallows, a profusion of grasses and lilies, and water weeds grow, forming rich pastures for the deer, and a secure hiding place for the many broods of wild ducks, that we saw sporting round their care' fid mother, as she watched with sleepless vigilance over them. 110 HILLS AND LAKES. My guide left his pack at the shantee, and giving Shack a hearty meal, ordered him to "watch it." "We started in our little craft to cross the lake. As we rounded a promontory, some half a mile from our starting place, we noticed a majestic eagle, perched upon the dead branch of an ancient hemlock that leaned out over the lake, a quarter of a mile, perhaps, distant. These birds, will sit thus for hours, pluming themselves, or watching in quietness the lake, for some heedless duck that may trust himself too far from the shore. We landed quietly, and I started with my rifle, to endeavor to approach near enough, to bring him down from his lofty perch. Happily the nature of the ground aided me in this ; a path worn by the deer, led round the lake, along which I could move, without disturbing the bird. I stole cautiously along, and having approached within range of my rifle, sighted carefully by the side of a tree, and fired. The ball struck the outer joint of his wing, and down came his feathered majesty, flapping and turning over and over, until he struck the surface of the lake. Having regained the canoe, we started to secure our prey. He was, indeed, a noble old bird ; his head and the feathers of his neck, and of his tail, were THE EAGLE. Ill white, while the rest of his plumage was of dark brown, approaching the black. He was not that drooping, dingy, rough, and unwashed thing, that we see in cages, and have pointed out to us, as the great king of American birds. As we approached, he made a desperate effort to fly away, failing in which, he faced i us with a look of defiance. There was a wild fierce- ness, an intensity in his eye, that spoke of the rapacity, as well as the courage of his nature. As we came near him, he opened his great beak, and hissed like a serpent, defiance at us. A blow on the head with a pole, after a brief struggle, stilled him, and we drew our noble captive into the boat. I am not sure that I felt precisely satisfied, for having slaughtered that princely bird. Me, at least, he had never harmed. He had slain, only to sustain his own life, and had killed, only to supply himself with food. .He was following only the instincts of his nature ; but was not I, also, following mine ? This was a question, which I left for settlement, to those more cunning in casuistry than myself. In the mean- time I retained his great quills, a few soft feathers of his plumage, and one of his claws, as trophies, and left his carcase to float on the scene of his own car- 112 HILLS AND LAKES. nage. He was like some great human heroes, using his strength for pillage, and his power only to destroy. I had, at least, removed one cause of terror, from the anxious hearts of the mothers of those harmless broods, that I had seen sporting near the opposite shore, the destruction of which, my victim- was no doubt watching an opportunity to achieve. " Squire," said Tucker, as we shot into a little bay, so shaded and delightfully cool that we could not re- sist the temptation of making it a resting place, " I've hearn people call the eagle a noble and magnanimous bird ; but it ain't so. He's a cussed thief and robber, as well as a murderer of things weaker than himself; he's a mean, selfish critter, that takes no pleasure in being sociable and friendly like ; he's always hunting for something to devour, and when he gets hold of a poor duck or rabbit, he flies to some solitary spot, all alone by himself, and eats it. He never invites any- body to dinner, and is sure to pick a quarrel with every bird he meets. I've hear'n tell of the eagle and his mate ; but I've been about these lakes twenty odd years, and have seen a many of eagles, but I never saw two together more'n two or three times, and they were always quarrellin' and nghtin', till one or the AN EAGLE COMBAT. 113 other had to give in, and leave. I suppose it must be that accordin' to nater, they go sometimes in pairs, else the breed would run out, but I never saw two together on terms anything like friendly. I mind, once, away down at Tupper's Lake, old Pete Meigs and I was layin' off under a grape-vine, that had crept up the trunk of a great elm, and stretched its x slender arms out all among the branches, and spread its great round leaves all over them, so that the sun couldn't pass through, we saw one of them birds settin' on the limb of a dry tree that leaned out over the lake. Presently we saw a dark shadow glancing over the water, and what should it be but another great eagle, making a stoop at the one settin' on the limb. He missed his / aim, however, and round and round they went, driv- ing and striking at each other, and screaming like owls. Once in a while they'd come together in the air, and, Squire, the way the feathers flew, was a caution to see. They seemed to grow madder and madder, till bye and by they had a regular clinch, and I'm blamed if they did'nt both come down together plump into the lake. This kind a cooled their fightin' humor, and they got out as fast as they could. One went back to his perch on the limb, and we saw blood 114 HILLS AND LAKES. on the white feathers about his neck. The other soared away, and we watched him till he became like a speck in the air, and then lost him in the depth of the sky. Now, there was room enough for both of 'em there, and prey enough for 'em both, too. But the one wanted to be alone, and the other would'nt let him, and so they must have a fight about it. " But, Squire, I said the eagle was a thief and a robber; and when I tell what I've seen, you'll say I'm right. I once saw a fish-hawk over at the Shata- gee make a dive for a trout, and catch him. He might have weighed two pounds, and the hawk had hard work to raise with him from the water. But he did rise with him, and what was curious to me, seemed anxious to get as high as he could. He kept strug- glin' upward, and screamin' in a most uncommon way, until he'd got up may be four or five hun- dred feet, when I saw what his trouble was. From above him, I saw a bald eagle comin' down, like a streak of chain lightnin', right upon him ; the poor hawk had no choice but to let go the trout he had provided for dinner. This was what the eagle was lookin' for, and swift as a bullet he dropt after the fish, and, Squire, how it could be I can't tell, but AN EAGLE'S NEST. 115 I'm blamed if he didn't grasp that fish in his great claws, long before it reached the water, and flew across the lake to a great rock, and devoured it. Now, I've no doubt he'd been watching that fish-hawk from his place, away up in the sky, to rob him of his lawful spoils. 'I say, again, the eagle's a robber and a thief, usin' his strength to plunder; and I give him a bullet whenever he comes within range of my rifle. He's a solitary, and a selfish bird too. I have seen their nests, and watched to see the old one bring food for her young; but at such time I never saw the father of the family. If there was one, he didn't think much of his home or children, for I never saw him about. May be he was away preparin' meals for his wife ; but he didn't stay much about home, that's cer- tain. I mind once, old Fete Meigs and I was up among the Adirondacks,- about the upper end of Long Lake, and the hundred other little lakes that lay there among the mountains. On one side of one of 'em, that I never heard the name of, is a high mountain, around the point of which the lake bends, and where the rocks rise high, away up in an almost a perpen- dicular precipice, we saw one of their nests. It waa built among the branches of a fir tree, that stretched 116 HILLS AND LAKES. out from the clefts midway up the rocks, and shot up- ward towards the sky, like the mast of a tall ship. Sticks and dry brush had been carried up, forming a nest larger than a corn basket. We watched for da;ys, while we were there, and saw the mother bringing food for her little ones. Sometimes it would be a duck ; sometimes a wood-rabbit ; and now and then a fish, that she'd plundered from a hawk. She always seemed to be busy ; but the he one we never saw, and, in my opinion, he took no charge of the family " XII. THE LAW cs 1 THB WOODS. Bio CLEAR POND. A CHASE AFTUR A DEER. A MOOSE PATH. AT evening we returned to our shantee, with a supply of trout, and a small deer that we had shot. "We found Shade watching his charge, and mighty glad he was to see us too. Like us, he relished his supper that night. " Tucker," said I, as we sat smoking our pipes after supper, and listening to the hooting of the owls, and the song of the whip-poor-will, "do you know that we have been breaking the law, and incurring a heavy penalty, by the killing of the deer, upon which we have been supping ?" " Squire," said he, " I've hearn tell of such a thing, and suppose it's so, but I never read the law, and shouldn't regard it much if I had. Not that I believe 118 HILLS AND LAKES. in disregardin' the law, as a general thing, but tLis one don't apply, and warn't ever intended to apply to the Shatagee Woods. Away off here, among the lakes and mountains, there's no justice of the peace, nor constables, nor witnesses either, unless we tell on one another. And if there was, there's a law above the statut' book that justifies us the law of hunger and of necessity. It is the same law that makes the eagle pounce upon and devour the harmless duck, that makes the fish -hawk seize his prey, and the painter destroy the deer, the law of instinct and self- preservation. I often think, he continued, " there are two kinds of laws, differin' as widely in their naters as light and darkness. The one bindin' everywhere, in the forest, as in the settlements ; in the fields, as in the cities ; to break which would be wrong of itself. The other, bindin' only to accordin' to circumstances. As regards the one, the wrong consists in the breakin' of it, whether the world knows of the breach or not. As to the other, the sin is in being caught in its violation. There's one law for the woods, and another for the settlements ; one for the deep forests, and another for the city. If I build a shantee of brush on a vacant lot in a city, and live there with my dog, I'm taken CITY vs. COUNTRY. 119 up as a vagrant, and sent to the penitentiary. Why ? Because there's houses enough in a city for all to sleep in, and it's onnateral to sleep outside of 'em, and the people think I'm around for no good. But who ever thought it out of the way of nater, for us away out here, where there ain't any houses, to sleep in our shantee in the depths of the Shatagree ? If I find a loafer in your street, torterin' and abusin' a dum animal, and I kick him by way of caution, I'm taken up for 'salt and battery, as it is called. Why ? Not because the fellow didn't deserve a kickin', nor be- cause I didn't sarve him right, but because there's courts, and constables, and law, by which he may be punished in a regular way. But who would think of takin' me up, for kickin' that cussed half-breed I told you of, for slaughtering the poor deer on the crust ? If in the night-time, in the streets of your city, I think to amuse myself by singing at the top of my voice, I'm taken to the watch-house, and locked up. Why ? Because I'm disturbin' the sleep of the people, alarmin' the timid, shaking the nerves of the sick, and breakin' the public peace. But if away off here in the deep forest, alone among the lakes and hills, I choose to strike up Hail Columby, whether to amuse myself, or 120 HILLS AND LAKES. wake up the sleeping echoes of the mountains, to hear my voice thrown back by the Adirondacks, who will say I have broken the peace, or disturbed the quiet of the people ? " The truth is, Squire, away off here in the wild woods, the law you speak of has no force. If I'm hungry, I've a right to furnish myself with venison. The law of nater and necessity permits it, and that I say again, is higher than the statut' book. But I've no right to steal your rifle, or murder you, even in the deepest and darkest recesses of the Shatagee. Why ? Because the law of nater and of conscience, of the great God himself, as well as of man, forbids it. And though you might rot where I slew you, and no man look upon your bones, though I myself should escape suspicion, yet the guilt would be as deep, and the wrong as great, as though done in the highways of the settlements, or the crowded streets of a city. But killin' a deer here in the woods, that belongs to nobody, that no one ever before saw, that no live man can lay any claim to, is another thing, even though there may be law agin it. It don't go agin my con- science to break such a law, and I don't care who knows it. If by killin' a deer when I want steaks for BIG CLEAE POND. 121 breakfast, or his rump for dinner, I -do go agin a piinted statut', I can still look you in the face as an honest man, because that statut' don't reach the Shatagee woods, nor the lakes and mountains of the Adirondacks. " Good," said I; " Tucker, you talk like a Judge, and without knowing it, have hit upon the legal phi- losophy of Blackstone." " I don't know," he replied, " who Blackstone is r but that's the philosophy and the law of the woods, as we understand it." We started next morning for Big Clear Pond, as it is called, a circular sheet of water, four or five miles in circumference, and some three miles from St. Regis Lake. Our way again lay over a range of hills, cov- ered with tangled brush, and loose boulders, that made travel exceedingly toilsome. This range of hills divides the head waters of the St. Regis River from those of the Saranac. The lake is properly named. Its waters are clear, and one can look away down into its depths, and see the white pebbles on its gravelly bottom, twenty or thirty feet beneath him. It is ex- ceedingly cold too, and if the trout with which it abounds, are not contented with their home, they are not capable of appreciating a good thing. r, 122 HILLS AND LAKES. This lake affords little pasture for the deer. Its shores are bold, and it produces none of the lilies and grasses, which so abound in the other lakes we had visited. We found a canoe here that had been left adrift, or had been floated away from its hiding place. It lay upon the beach, as if it had drifted there when the waters were high, and was left high and dry when they receded. It was without oars or paddles ; the latter, however was soon hewn out by my guide, and we launched it, for a voyage round the lake. We spent the balance of the day on this beautiful sheet of water, and slept in a shantee on its shore. Here, for the first time, we had no prospect of taking a deer, from such as should come to the water to feed ; but, we were not, therefore, to be without venison. I have before said that Shack had a sprinkling of the Stag Hound in his veins, and would as a consequence, fol- low a track not as staunch, certainly, as one of purer blood, but sufficiently long to satisfy our purpose here. So long as he would follow, he kept his game in active play, and his half hour always made a deer exceed- ingly busy. My guide stationed me at a point where a low ridge terminated in the lake, as the place where the deer would be most likely to take to the water, LITTLE CLEAR POND. 123 and then started up the valley with the dog to put him on the trail. I had been waiting, perhaps half an hour, when I heard the quick, sharp, currish yelp of Shack, some distance off, on the side of the mountain. In a few minutes I heard the long bounds of a deer, as he came crashing through the brush towards the lake, with the dog some six or eight rods behind him, barking quick and sharp, at every jump. The deer leaped into the water, some eight rods from me, and struck out for the opposite shore. A ball from my rifle stopped him I was soon along side of him with the canoe, and passing my hunting knife across his throat, the pure waters around him became crimson with his blood. From Big Clear Pond we struck across a ridge some two miles to Little Clear Pond, a sheet of water covering perhaps three hundred acres. This little lakelet, if I may be permitted to coin a word, is a per- fect gem, laying there all alone, skirted by tall forest trees, and overlooked by the hills, its waters trans- parent and cold, undisturbed by a ripple, and reveal- ing the white pebbles that glisten away down in ita quiet depths. We dined on its banks, beneath a festoon of vines, that spread out among the 124 ZILLS AND LAKES. of an ancient elm. "While smoking, after our siesta, we saw a number of gray wood-rabbits hopping about, cocking up their long ears as they scented our cook- ery, and bounding away, when they looked upon our faces. The red squirrels chatted and chased each other up and down the trees around us, the partridges drummed on their logs, and the birds regaled us with their songs. To all this enjoyment there was one drawback the bills of the musquitos were long, and the sting of the black fly severe. A mink came steal- i ing along the margin of the lake, turning over the Hat stones, and looking for frogs, and small fish along the shore. He was worth shooting, and I gave him a shot. My hand was unsteady, or my eye-sight not clear, and all the harm I did him was to give him a terrible fright. He wont forget his narrow escape, for the ball went awfully near his head. He will have something to tell his neighbors, that will sound apoch- ryphal in minkdom. Having viewed this charming little sheet of water to our satisfaction, we followed what my guide termed a moose path, along the outlet, some three miles to the head of the Upper Saranac. I would not have it inferred that this path was trodden like a highway, or A MOOSE PATH. 125 that we saw any spoor of the moose. It was made when that animal was vastly more abundant than it is now. It was, however, easily traceable ; the deer and other animals travelled it, and it saved us much labor and trouble in guiding us directly to the lake below. XIII THB UPPER SARANAO. A SONG ON THE "WATER- A WOODMAN'S NOTION o? THE PAST, THE PRESENT, AND THE FUTURE, OF AMERICA. WE struck the Upper Saranac towards sundown. Here we found a shantee of poles, for whatever hunter might stray away to that lonely region. "We took possession, and having cleared away the dry branches used the year before for a bed, and having swept and garnished the floor, we supplied new boughs on which to repose, and went out to secure a supper. This, the watdr and the air supplied us with, for while I caught a string of trout in the stream which forms the imet, my guide shot a brace of partridges, which Shack treed for him on a hemlock near the shantee. We supped as the sun gave his last rays, to glisten on the brow of the mountains, on the opposite side of the lake. My guide had hid away his canoe at some dis- A SONG ON THE WATER. 127 tance down the lake, and started off to procure it, that we might take an early start in the morning, on a voyage down the Saranac. I sat upon a boulder on the margin of the lake. The sun had gone down, and the grayness of twilight was fast settling upon all things ; the stars stole out, one after another, and were rc-lected from away down in the bosom of the waters. The evening was perfectly calm. The lake lay like a mirror before me. The leaves stood still on the trees, and all nature seemed sinking into stillness and re- pose. Anon, the voice of my guide rung out over the waters in simple song, as he paddled his light canoe homeward. How it might have sounded in a concert hall, I will not pretend to say, but it floated full, and clear, and musical over the waters that night, and to me it seemed full of sweetness and harmony. I thought if the Swedish Nightingale had been out there, on that silent lake that calm evening, giving to the still air the sweet songs of her northern home, her voice would have entranced the listener, like the seraphs' hymns, as they minister in the choirs of heaven. How I should love to hear it swelling over the still waters of the Saranac, and dying away in far- off echoes along its woody shores. But those old for 128 HILLS AND LAKES. ests will never hear her voice, nor their sleepily echoes waken to its harmony. Long years hence, the sweet voice of some other songstress may float over those slumbering waters, but those old primeval trees will be gone. Broad meadows, waving grain, and rich pastures will be there, but these old forests will have been swept away. The songtress will sit on the doorsill of her own dwelling, on the margin of that beautiful lake, her kindred will be around her, and her song will be a lullaby to her little one that slum- bers upon her bosom. The wild deer, the moose, the catamount, and the panther will have disappeared, and that they ever existed there, will remain only in tradition. The iron horse will go thundering among those sequestered valleys, dragging his ponderous train, and snorting in the greatness of his strength. As we sat on that moss-covered boulder, watching the fire-flies flashing their tiny torches as they floated over the lake, dotting the shadows of night with spots of brightness, gone almost as soon as seen, my guide, in his quiet way, began one of his curious but modest discourses, to which it was always a pleasant thing to listen; "I've often thought," said he, " how strange it was that this great country of America, equal as A WOODMAN'S NOTION OF AMERICA. 129 IVe been told to one quarter of the earth, aud may be more, should have lain here all alone for so many hun- dreds and thousands of years, and the people of the great world know nothing about it. I say the people of the great world, for I don't reckon the Ingens as people. There were many, very many tribes scattered all over, having their own hunting grounds, and livin* in the woods ; but they were wild like other animals, and savage as any other beasts of prey. They couldn't be called people, because, tho' may be they were human, yet they were wild men and women of the woods, having no knowledge of human ways, and no notion of improvin.' They hunted as the painter and the wolf hunts, only to supply nater, and while they lived together in tribes, in that they did no more than the wolves do,* they lived in huts, and so did the beaver. IVe often thought I'd like to have seen this great country, when it was all wild and nateral like ; when from the shores of the old Bay State to the Mississippi, and from the cold north, away down to the Gulf of Mexico, the old forest stretched away, and in all this, not one civilized man could be found, before any axe had broken the still- ness of the woods, when no city or town, church or 6* 130 HILLS AND LAKES. farm-house, or green field could be seen; with the great rivers windin', like gigantic serpents, along the deep valleys, and the wooded plains, upon whose majestic waters no ships spread their white sails, or or steamboats puffed their smoke. I've hearn tell of the great prairies, that stretch away from the Missis- sippi to the foot of the Rocky Mountains, that lay spread out there, like great a meadow, thousands of miles around 'em, without a fence or a road crossin' them. Squire, 'twould have been a sight to see those vast wastes, before the foot of the white man had crossed the great Father of Waters, as I've hearn it called, all covered with tall grass, wavin' like an ocean of grain, and reaching out, away and away, hundreds of miles beyond where the eagle, in his highest flight, could see. I should like to have seen those Vast droves of buffalo, fightin', and bellowin', and pursuin', and hustlin' each other, spreadin' out all over the plain like a mighty army of horned beasts ; and then, when some terror seized the herd, how the earth must have shook beneath the thunderin' hoofs of their flying hosts. I should like to have been the first white man that looked upon such a gigantic wil- derness as this country then was, to have come up A HUNTER'S WISH. 131 the Hudson from its mouth, away down by the sea,-- to have floated upon its waters, as they rolled then so jsolitary through the Highlands, and seen the painters and catamounts watchin' me from the cliffs, and the deer starin' at me from the level shore, to have paddled up old Champlain and down the great St. Lawrence, and then to have skirted old Ontario, away up to where Niagara pours its mighty flood, thun- derin' and shakin' the earth, as it rushes down from the beetling cliffs, to have coasted Lake Erie, and the other great seas that lay away out west, to have crossed over to the Mississippi, and floated on its broad bosom back to the ocean ! That would have been a trip, Squire, worth a lifetime, and a thing for a man to tell his children of, of a winter's night, when he was old. I've often thought I'd like to leave the settlements and highways of life, even now, and stray away off among the solitudes of the Rocky Mountains, and the vast regions beyond them, and spend a few years beyond the footprints of a white man. I'd like to trap the beavers, and skrimmage with the grizzly bears, and hunt the elk, and foller the other sports that belong to such a wild and far-off region. Old Pete Meigs and I often talked of such a trip, but tbu 132 HILLS A NT> LAKES. old man had the weight oi too many years on his shoulders, and I loved my wife and children too well to allow of our taking it. You and I, Squire, shan't see it, but this country is spreadin' and spreadin' out, and the time will soon be, when a man can go in a lortmght from the Bay State to the great ocean of the West, crossin' the great prairies, and dashing over the Kocky Mountains, down into the broad valleys be- yond them, where will be found great cities, rich farms, and millions of people." " Why," said I, " Tucker, you're getting poetical You've furnished a theme for thought which we had better i u prove upon our bed of boughs in the shantoc," In l.'io morning we started down the Upper Sara- nac. T'is lake is the largest in all this region, being some fourteen or fifteen miles in length, by from one to three in breadth. In speaking of distances I do not profess to be precisely correct ; I give the best of my judgment only, and I have not myself the most perfect confidence in its accuracy. I am not, there- fore, to be held responsible for any mistakes that may occur in my measurements. I judge of the size of the lakes by my eye, and of the distance from each other, by the time it took us to travel it. These are A DOG'S TRAINING. 133 all my means of knowledge on the subject, and those who may come after me, must take the risk of my being mistaken. About half of a mile or more from the head of the lake is an island, containing, I should judge, about one hundred and fifty acres. It was covered with trees and underbrush, like the forest on the main land. We landed on this island, and found no diffi- culty in procuring fish for breakfast. " Now, Squire, I'll show you one of the knowing ways of Shack," said my guide, "and some good sport into the bargain. I educated that dog myself, for the woods, and so long as he's with me, he ain't to be beat. You see he don't start off, after everything he sees, as a green one would do, and as he did, when I first took him with me into the woods to larn him his A B C's. He travels along with us, steady and regular as we go ourselves, doin' what he's bid, and no more. He listens to what we say, and I'm blamed if I don't believe he's a notion of the meanin' of my huntin' stories, when I tell 'em to you. He's an ex- ample of what trainin' from a kind master, will make of an honest dog, and what improvement the animal can attain to." He called his dog, and going a few 134 HILLS AND LAKES. rods to an elevated spot, waved his hand to him, and cried, "Hunt 'em up! hunt 'em up,! Be off, sir." Shack seemed to understand him perfectly, and away he dashed, coursing here and there, further and further off, until we lost sight and sound of him in the woods. In a short time we heard the bark of Shack in pursuit of something, and in five minutes a buck came dash- ing round the end of the island where we were, hor- ribly frightened, with Shack a few rods behind him, yelping sharp and fierce, at every bound. We did not choose to spoil the sport by the use of our rifle, so we cheered on the dog, as he sped by us, and around they went again like coursers. The island was not large enough to allow the dog to get out of hearing, and it- was truly an exciting thing, to hear his fierce sharp cry, and trace "by the sound, the rapidity of the chase. I have stated before, that Shack was not so staunch and persevering a follower, as a dog of purer breed would have been, but so long as he would follow, his pace was tremendous, and the game before him always had an exceedingly busy time of it. Kound they came again, that deer and Shack, the former more frightened, and the latter more fierce, if possible. The deer had gained a trifle of his pursuer, but the THE DEER HUNT. 135 pace was evidently telling upon him. His tongue was out, and we heard his panting as he passed us. There was no speed lost by lofty bounding, as we often see in the deer, as he dashes through the forest ; no looking back over his shoulder, and waiving his white flag in defiance, as if glorying in the speed of his flight. But his nose pointed straight out one way, and his tail the other, as he stretched himself like a race-horse, in long low bounds, every muscle strained to escape. Again we cheered on the dog, and away they went in another heat round the island. Shortly after the cry of Shack rounded the lower end of the island, we saw the deer plunge into the water, and strike out for the main land. Shack, too, plunged after him in pursuit, but the buck was greatly his su- perior in swimming, and he soon gave over and re- turned to the island. We might easily have over- taken the deer with our canoe, but we had no occasion for venison, and we let him go. We watched him as he swam manfully for the shore, leaving a long wake in the still water behind him. I saw him through my glass as he waded slowly to the land and steal quietly into the woods, seemingly wearied enough, but rejoic- ing in his escape. XIV. A SPORTING EXCURSION. A FOREST CHASE. THE Music OF TH:I HOUNDS. THE MAN WHO KILLED THE PANTHER AND THE BIO BUCK. "We rigged a bush sail and started before a light breeze, for another and larger island two or three miles distant. " The way old Pete Meigs and I came to be acquainted," said my guide, as we floated down the lake, " or rather the reason why he took me to his feelins, was this : A great many years ago, two gen- tlemen came from York city to Plattsburgh, to go over to the Shazee, to fish and hunt. I was about eighteen years old then, but I'd grown up by the side of the old man, and though I was a tough specimen for my age, he seemed to think I was a child still. It warn't then as it is now. The clearins had'nt pushed oack the woods, as they've since done, and the State A SPORTING EXCURSION. 13/ had'nt built stone houses away up here, to keep bad men in, from doin' mischief. The place where Clin- ton Prison stands, was ten good miles outside of a fence, and a man had to travel fifteen long ones, out- side of a road or clearin', to get to the Shazee. Those men from the city, were green enough in our forest ways, but they wanted to learn, and had the real grit in 'em, too, only it wanted bringin' out. They'd been raised in the city, in a human way, and without bein' spoiled, and did'nt calculate they know'd more, and were better'n everybody else. I was down at Platts- burgh when they came there, and hearin' them talk- in' about a guide, I told 'em of old Pete Meigs. I knew the old man was home, for I talked with him on my way, in the morning. They got a team, and I went with them to old Pete's, and we struck a bar* gain, he to go with 'em as a guide, and I as a kind of pack-horse, to carry the provisions, and the other things needful. I did'nt take my rifle that trip, for the Yorkers being unused to travelin' in the woods, old Pete and I, had to tote the fixins. Next morning bright and early, we started for the Shazee. We had fifteen long miles afore us, without a path, over high lulls and down into the deep valleys, crossin' the 138 HILLS AND LAKES. streams, and stumbling among the tangle brush and boulders. If the Yorkers war'nt tired enough when we got to the lake, you may shoot me. "We'd been all day about that job, and the sight of the waters laying there so bright and still, was a pleasant thing to their eyes. We did'nt mind it much, because we were used to it. With us, a day's work was a day's work, whether in the woods or in the fields. Old Pete and I put up a shantee for the Yorkers, and made them a nice bed of boughs with a smudge before it, to keep off the musquitos and black flies ; we left them sleeping sound enough, and started to procure a mess of trout for supper. " The old man had drawn his canoe away out of the water, a month or two before, and hid it away among the brush. From some accident, may be the lightning, the woods had got on fire, and instead of his canoe, we found only a few charred and useless chunks. May be the old man didn't swear some, but t'want no use. The canoe was clean spoilt, and any amount of swearin' wouldn't mend it. It only cost us a hard day's work to make another, which, by the way, we had finished on the next day but one. But for all the loss of the canoe, we did'nt go without our THE DEER HOUNDS. 139 supper ; for standin' on the rocks, we got trout enough in a few minutes ; and when the gentlemen woke up, we had 'em ready cooked after the ways of a hunter. The way them trout disappeared from before the York- ers, was a sight to see, Old Pete had two of the finest deer hounds I ever happened to see, especially an old one that the old man called Eoarer. He was a great tan-colored animal, with a broad chest, and a mouth like an oven, with great loose lips hangin' down from his jaws, and ears like an elephant's. His voice was like a trumpet, and the way he'd make the woods ring with his music, was a pleasant thing to hear. These dogs he had taken with him, to show the gentlemen what sport was in the Shatagee country. " The next morning we were up by the dawn. Our Yorkers were fresh and fierce for the sights and fun of the woods. Everything around was new to 'em. The thousand voices that one hears in the for- est, were things for them to admire and talk about. We concluded to have a chase the first thing in the morning, not to run the deer into the lake, for our canoe was gone, and we couldn't catch 'em there ; so we started to drive the ridges, as we call it. The old 140 HILLS AND LAKES. man knew the woods like a book, and could always tell by the make of a country, where away a deer would run, when pressed by the dogs. Now, Squire, a deer has ways of his own, which a man who has lived among 'em and hunted 'em, can understand. When pressed, he will take to a ridge, and. follow it till he's tired, and then he'll take to the water if he can, to throw off the dogs. ;t Well, before the sun was up, we started out back of the lake, and old Pete stationed the Yorkers some forty rods apart, on a low ridge that stretched away from the lake, far into the woods, at a spot where he knew the deer would be most likely to pass. Having placed them to suit him, he lent me his rifle, and took me, may be a quarter of a mile beyond, and placing me near a great oak at the head of a broad, shallow ravine, left me to lay on the dogs. He hadn't no great notion then of my merits, as a hunter, or as a marksman, and I've allers believed he placed me there, more to get me out of the way, and keepin' me from spoilin' sport for the Yorkers, than anything else, for from what I've learned of the ways of the animal and the woods since, there warn't much danger of a deer's comin' near me. * Now,' said he, * Joe THE PAINT EE. 141 understand, we're here arter deer, and not arter part- ridges or squirrels, and you're not to spoil sport by shootin' anything short of a painter or a big buck ;' and the- old man grinned, as he started off with his hounds. u He hadn't been out of sight long, and I'd seen 'twas all right with the rifle, when I heard a scratchin 7 like among the branches of the great oak, six or eight rods from which I was standing. Looking over that way, Squire, I'm blamed if I didn't see, laying stretched out along one of the great branches that put out towards me from the trunk of that old oak, may be thirty feet from the ground, a great painter, lookin 7 with most villainous fierceness straight at me. That was the first of these varmints that I'd ever seen alive in the woods, and the way I kind a crept all over, warn't pleasant. I was standin' by the side of a maple which was partly between me and the animal, and I warn't sorry it was so. I don't know as the painter meant me any harm. It's very likely he'd made up his mind to let me alone, if I'd let him alone ; but I didn't like the way he eyed me. I drew up old Pete's rifle by the side of the tree, and my hand shook some as I sighted at his head. I wasn't fool enough to fire 142 HILLS AND LAKES. till my hand was steady, for I knew if I was cairn, I could put a ball between his eyes from where I stood, and no mistake. I sighted him close and steady at last, and pulled. The painter leaped straight towards, and fell a few yards from me, dead, with his skull shattered by my ball. ' There,' said I to myself, as I fell to reloading my rifle, * old Pete didn't think when he told me to fire only at a painter, or a big buck, that, that cussed critter was about.' I was a big feelin' man then, Squire, and about the proudest one in the Shatagee country. " I was examinin' the beast, when I heard far off in the woods, the voice of old Eoarer, deep and drawn-out-like at first; after a moment I heard it again. The time between his baying became shorter and shorter, till the dogs both broke out in a fierce continuous cry, and I knew the game was up and away. I needn't tell you, Squire, of the music there is in the voice of a pair of stag hounds, in the deep forests of a still morning. How it echoes among the mountains, and swells over the quiet lake ; how it comes up like a trumpet from the forest dells, and glancin' away upward, seems to fill the whole air with its joyous notes. The dogs took a turn away to the THE DEER HUNT. 143 westward. The sound of the chase grew fainter and fainter, as it receded, until it was lost to the ear in the distance, and the low voice of the morning breeze whisperin' among the forest leaves, alone was heard. After a few minutes, I heard, faint and far off, the music of the chase again, swellin' up in the distance, and then dyin' away like the sound of a flute in the distance, when the night air is still. Louder and more distinct it came, as the dogs coursed over a dis- tant ridge. I stood, as I said, at the head of a shal- low but broad ravine, or rather valley ; to the right and left, the ridge stretched away like a horse-shoe, leavin' within its curve a densely- wooded hollow. I heard the hounds as they crossed this ridge far below me, loud and joyous, makin' the woods vocal with the melody of their voices. Again the music died away, as they plunged into the hollow way before me, until it seemed to .come up like the faint voice of an echo, from that leafy dell. Again it swelled louder, and fiercer, as the chase changin' its direction swept up the valley. Louder and louder grew the music ; I heard the measured bounds of a deer, as he dashed up the ridge on which I stood, some forty rods from me, and wheelin' suddenly from the direction in which he was 144 HILLS AND LAKES. goin', ail enormous buck broke, with the speed of a race-horse from the thicket of underbrush that had concealed him, directly towards where I was standin'. I was ready, and as he came withiri a few rods of me, I fired. He leaped high into the air, -and fell to the ground. My huntin' knife was soon passed across his throat, and his struggles were over. It was a noble buck. I have been a hunter ever since, and I have seen few larger than the one I shot that morning. " In the meantime, the dogs swept by me in full cry towards where the Yorkers were stationed. It % seemed that two deer had been started by the hounds? and had ran together, until they struck the ridge on which I stood, when one had turned suddenly from his course, and the other fled forward. I heard two shots in quick succession. In a few minutes the music of the dogs ceased, and I knew the chase was over. I passed down to the Yorkers, and found them rejoicin' over a fine doe they had slain. Both had fired upon her the one woundin', and the other killin* her. They supposed she had passed me, and took it for granted I had missed her. Old Pete came in. He had heard my first shot, and supposed of course, I had been firm' at some triflin' game. The old man JOE, SAID HE AS HE HELD OU1 1 HIS HAND, SKIN ME IF YOU UAVENT DONE IT. Paae 145. THE DEATH. 145 joined the Yorkers, in laughing at me. * Come,' s _d I, as I took him by the arm, ' go with me, and I'll show you what a hunter can do.' We went up to where the buck lay, and you ought to have seen the old man's eyes open, as he rolled him over. 'Joe,' said he, as he held out his hand, ' skin me, if you haven't done it. I've been after that buck for two years. Why, he's the old one of the Shatagee.' I led him to where lay the painter, ' There,' said I, 'you told me to kill a painter, and a big buck, and I've done it.' The old man threw his arms around me, and from that time, I was to him as a son. Many and many's the time I've hearn him tell that story, and been pointed out by him as the man that shot the painter and the big buck." 7 XV. TOTTOH YARNS A SHELTER IN A STORM. AN ASTONISHED BBAH AN UNINVITED GUEST, AND HIS UNCEREMONIOUS EXPULSION u TUCKEE," said I, as he finished his story, " it's my opinion you sometimes shoot with something be- sides a rifle, what we call, in the city, a long bow." li Squire," he replied, " I won't pretend not to take your meanin', nor find fault with you for expressin 7 it ; but what I tell you I've seen, and done myself, you may set down as a sure and certain thing. I don't deny, that down in the settlements, among tellers that think themselves tall timber, I stretch matters a little, and make things look a good deal bigger than the real facts will warrant. I've told 'em about killin' a buck that weighed four hundred, that had, may be, fifteen or twenty prongs to a Lorn : 'but that was always by way of taking the starch out of fellers that pretended to krow the ways of the woods, A LONG Bow. 147 and lied out of whole cloth. Let me tell you, Squire, twenty odd year in the Shatagee country, and among the Adirondacks, brings a man acquainted with a good many curious facts to talk about, and he needn't tell anything but the simple truth, to get up a pretty tall name for shootin', as you say, with something be- sides a rifle. Between old Pete Meigs and I, we never stretched the honest truth. Any man that went with him into the woods, might be sure that, strange as the story might be the old man told, it was gospel truth. He was proud of his knowledge of the ways of wild animals, and the things he'd seen in the woods, and he was principled agin deceivin 7 ' the man that trusted him. No man ever came back, after a tramp with him in the forest, that wasn't wiser, and that in solid truths, than when he started. But in the settlements, it was another thing. He didn't mind drawing a long bow there, by way of stuffing the green ones, and the way he did it was a thing to laugh at. "I mind once we was down to Plattsburgh, and" stayed all night at a tavern there. In the evenin' some fellows came in, that had been over to the Shazee. They'd done pretty well, considerin' they didn't know much about woodcraft, and the stories 148 HILLS AND LAKES. they told were amazin'. They made a set at the old man, to draw hini out. It warn't very difficult to start him, and the way he went ahead was surprising Knowing the old man's truthfulness in the woods, it was a new thing to hear him tell such whopping lies about fishin' and huntin', but a sly wink told me they wan't meant for me, and I knew it was all right, but such stories, Squire, I never happened to hear before. 1 mind one he told, by way of a wind up, was this : 'I was,' said the old man, 'four years ago, away up among the Saranacs, and had strayed away four or five miles from my shantee, when there came on the orfullest storm of rain, and wind, and thunder and lightnin' that ever mortal man heard tell on, you ought to have been up there, boys, to have hearn the thunder boomin' and roarin' through the heavens, and peelin' and echoin', and knockin' about among the Adirondacks, to have seen the lightnin' flashin' and flamin' along the ground, and dartin' down from the clouds into the tall trees, and smashin' them into a thousand splinters, to've hearn the timber crashin' and thunderin' to the ground, as if all nater was goin' to ruin in one universal smash. Well, if I warn't scared that time, you may shoot me. So, lookin' THE STORM. 149 across a low swampy piece of ground, I saw the great holler trunk of a sickarnore that had fallen, and I put across, thinkin' I could crawl in there, and be safe from the rain and fallin' timber. As I struggled through the swamp, I sunk knee deep into a kind of clay, white as paint, and my boots were plastered by it, as if I'd run my legs into a tub of batter. I crawled away into the log, and let me tell you, boys, it warn't a bad place to be in just then. I lay there snug enough for about half an hour, the storm ragin' all the time harder'n harder, and as I heard it roarin' ^and surgin' around me, I made up my mind that a holler log was a good place in sich a storm. All at once the hole I came in at was darkened, and something came gruntin' and squeezin' in towards where I lay. " Human nater!" tho't I, "what's that?" After a little, I saw by the light that streamed in, in little streaks by him, that 'twas a huge bear. I wasn't scared, for I knew he didn't know I was there, and besides, a bear allers goes into a holler ...log backwards, so that the end he bites with wasn' towards me. I didn't care about havin' a fight with him just then, and if I killed him in the log, I didn't exactly see how I was to get out by him. So I drew up my legs, as he came backin' 150 HILLS AND LAKES. up towards me, and when he got about near enough, I straitened out ; and the way I sent rny boots agin his back settlements, was a thing to wonder at. If ever a dum animal was astonished, I reckon it was that bear ; and the way he put for daylight, was curi- ous. As he grunted and hustled towards the outside of the log, I followed on my elbers and rump, and the kicks I gave him in the stern, shot him like a cannon ball, about twenty feet down the banks. " There," said I, " you darned black, stern goin', round about circum- stance, be off to your own hum, and let honest people's houses alone." He didn't stop to make any answer, nor to ask any questions, but put out at his best gait for the Shatagee, and it's my opinion he never know'd what it was that booted him out of that holler log. He was done with the Saranac lakes, for he was shot the next day, forty miles away down by the Lower Shatagee. I know it was the same bear, for there was the white prints of my clayey boots on his rump, plain as a pike staff. If you don't believe it, you may ask Joe Tucker there, (pointin' to me,) for he's the man that shot him.' I didn't, of course, con- tradict the story, and the fellers standin around, took it all for gospel. But many's the time I've quizzed THE WOODS. 151 old Pete Meigs about tlie bear, whose rump lie painted with his boots, in the holler log." Our course kept us but a few rods from the shore, and we could look into the little bays and inlets as we passed along. There are many lovely spots along the coast of the Upper Saranac, which, had we not seen many others- in our forest route as lovely, would have claimed a more careful survey. The beautv of the scenery around these lakes, to be appreciated, must be seen. More than that, it must be seen bv those who have a taste for the woods who love to be sometimes alone, beyond the hum of the thousand voices, that are heard in the thoroughfares of life the tramp, tramp of moving thousands to be awav. among nature's unshorn, as well as unadorned loveli- ness ; to hear her, unawed by the sights and sounds of civilization, talking (as my guide termed it) to herself. They must be men of patience and some nerve, who are, for the sake of the pleasure, willing to submit to some privation, to encounter some weari- ness, and much discomfort. The student, whose frame is enervated, by the corrupted and heated atmosphere of a city, and the debilitating influences of his vocation, will find himself growing stronger, his frame more 152 HILLS AND LAKES. vigorous, nis step lighter every day, that he breathes the fresh pure air of the lakes and mountains. Every drop of sweat, forced from his pores by the weariness of travel in the woods, will carry off some particle of disease. He will sleep calmly, and sweetly, on his bed of boughs at night, and rise in the morning, full of freshness and strength. His food will be pleasant, and his digestion good. He will be astonished at the increase of his powers of consumption, and after a few weeks of hard work, but full of enjoyment in the woods, he will come out a better and a wiser man, with renewed vigor, and a longer lease life. XVI. SIGNS OF BAIN. THE TREE FBOO. A RAINY DAT IN THJB FORBST THE breeze had now floated us to the second island. We shot into a little bay, and remained for a short time, admiring the scenery around us. " Squire," said my guide, as we lay in this little bay, enjoying its cool shades, " it always seems to me that a man thinks more and better away off in the woods, among the wild kritters and nateral things, than he does in the settlements or in the towns. That he comes to be what you call a philosopher a sort of nateral poet and though he mayn't write verse or string rhymes, yet there's real poetry in his heart and in his feelins'. He sees things that sets him a reflect- in 1 , and makes him inquire into their nater, and it's thinkin', and inquirin', that makes people wise. Ex- perience is a great thing everywhere, but a man won't 7* 154 HILLS AND LAKES. improve much, if lie don't look into the reason of things that he sees around him. Anybody out here in the woods, when he builds his shantee, would cover it with bark so as to shed rain, if he saw a black cloud in the south-west, and saw the lightnin' playin' around its edges ; but it takes a 'cute observer to look into a cloudless sky, and say it will rain afore morn- ing, or it will be a wet day to-morrow, and have his sayin' come out true. " You, now, though you may be a smart lawyer at home, don't know that we shall want a shelter afore mornin', and won't leave it until noon to-morrow, un- less we agree to be out in the rain but I know it, and if you wan't to know how I know it, I'll tell you. Just listen to the tree-frog, how merrily he pipes all along the shore, up among the branches of the scrub- by trees that grow out of the rocks ; well, he says, 1 it'll rain.' Listen again to the loon hear, with what a loud, clear voice he speaks, and how it quavers and sinks away into silence ; you havn't heard that voice since we left Indian Lake. That loon says, 'it will rain.' Hark again, and you'll hear not a rustling among the leaves and branches of the trees, but a kind of deep far-off moaning ; not the creaking of one tall tree SIGNS OF RAIN. 155 9 against another a sour.d that don't seem exactly to be a sound either a sound that we seem to hear but can't describe ; you can't tell what way it comes from, whether from the right hand or left, that seems to be far off, and yet you can't say it isn't close by ; yet it's in the forest, all around you. Well, that mysterious voice says, ' it will rain.' Look at that brood of young ducks, scampering about, dipping their heads under the water, and lettin' it run down their backs see the old one, how often she sits up on eend, and flaps her wings, as if about flyin' away those ducks are sayin', plain as day, 'it will rain.' Look at that baswood tree on the point before you see how fan-like it lifts its leaves, turnin' their under side to the sun, makin' the tree-top shine all over like silver ; that tree is tellin' us ' it will rain.' Even Shack, there, in the bow of the canoe, by his uneasy motions, curling him- felf up in a heap at t the bottom, and then as soon as he's fairly settled, gettin' onto his feet again, and nosin' out over the water, he says ' it'll rain.' "Now, Squire, it's by observin' and puttin' things together that a woodman comes to understand such matters. I don't consider such knowledge any great tilings, but n sho'.vs that all the larnin' in the world 156 HILLS AND LAKES. ain't found in books and isn't got in the colleges. A greenhorn would be just as likely to hunt with the wind, as against it, and wonder why he didn't get sight of a deer. I could tell him why ; it's because a deer can smell a man twenty, and may be forty rod when he hunts with the wind, and will get out of his way ; while he who hunts agin the wind, the deei won't smell him at all, and he knocks him over. You see how suddenly that brood of young - ducks have disappeared. Well, a man not used to their ways would say, they hid away because they saw us ; but when I see that, I look round for a bald eagle, and he's sure to be soarin', like that one yonder, in the sky. These things, as I said, ain't much of them- selves ; but it's such small things that set men to thinkin', and studyin', and at last roils up into a heap of knowledge. It may be, it wouldn't be worth much to trade on, in the cities; but it's a good thing out ^ere in the Shatagee, and don't hurt a man anywhere. I've hearn it said, that a great many years ago, a man was restin' himself under the shades of an apple tree, when one of the apples fell to the. ground, that it set him to thinkin' why it should fall down to the ground, instead of upwards, towards the sky, and that THE POWER OF THOUGHT. 107 by thinkin', and observing and studyin', he built up a great system of philosophy that has ever since been taught in the schools, and given to the world a deal of knowledge it didn't possess before. It's thinkin 1 and study in' and observing that made the steam en- gine, and the telegraph, and the locomotive, and rail- roads, and steamboats, and the spinin' machines, and iron ploughs, and many other useful contrivances, that belong 'to the times we live in. These things don't concern me much, for my ways ain't like the ways of most men. I love the woods better'n the settlements or the cities. I don't need but little to live on, and I don't want to be rich ; but they help the world along amazin'ly, and I like to see it. The Shatagee Woods will last as long as I shall, and 1 shall stay among 'em ; but people that don't like the woods, they help to a livin', and if they want to go ahead, they can go. " I mind once, I was over on the Lower Shatagee, with a man from Montreal. He wasn't a hunter, nor much given to fishin' ; but he'd a likin' for the woods, and I paddled him round the lake for a week. He went knockin' the stones to pieces, and lookin' into the nater of all the rocks about, and study in' the 158 HILLS AND LAKES. flowers, and pressin' them between the leaves of a great book. He didn't care much about the deer, but he cracked away with his double barrel, at every wood-bird he could find. When he got what he called a specimen, he took off the skin, and stowed it away, as he said, to be stuffed when he got home. Well, what I was goin' to tell you is, we was out one day on the lake ; it was warm, and the sun shone down clear, and bright, and hardly a breath of air was stirrin'. On our return to the shantee at noon, he looked at a machine he had hung up against the poles, and says he, ' Friend Tucker, there's rain a brewing and you'd better mend the roof of your wig- wam.' I hadn't noticed the signs, and how he came to know there was going to be a storm, beat me. Well, I went out, and looked about me, and listened, and sure enough, there was no mistakin' the appear- ance of things. Now the machine he looked at, told him as plain as A B C, what weather was ahead. It's name I disremember, but you, may be, know all about it. - I allers thought it took a good deal of studyin' and lookin' into the nater of things, to invent a ma- chine to foretell a storm." We shot out from the little bay, and paddled on > BEPAKATIONS FOR RAIN. 159 ^ap^uy a liglit, pleasant breeze was blowing down the lake, and holding a bush, with the butt end on the bottom of the boat, so that the breeze would strike it, was my part of the labor. In the afternoon a haze gathered in the air ; a veil, of thinnest gauze, seemed to be drawn over the heavens - r a halo surrounded the sun ; the tree-frog sang louder than ever ; the duck- lings sported more joyously, and all the signs spoken of by my guide, became more strikingly manifest. We landed, between four and five o'clock, on the third island, and set about constructing a shanty, which would afford shelter from the rain, which it was now certain would visit us. We selected a site by the trunk of a large tree tha.t had fallen. Having pro- cured two forked saplings, of some three inches in diameter, we fastened them securely in the ground, about ten feet from the log, and eight feet from each other. Across these, in the crotches, we laid a pole, some five feet from the ground, and then placed an- other, from each crotch to the log, for rafters ; across these again, at a distance of two feet from each other, we laid other poles. My guide peeled bark from the birch trees around us, with which we made a roof, as impervious to the rain, as one of tiles. The ends we 160 {IILLS AND LAKES. built up with boughs, to keep off the lateral dampness. Behind the log, we scooped out a rude trench, to carry off the water that should drip from the eaves of our dwelling ; thus, in twc hours, we had construct- ed a secure shelter from the rain, let it come when it might. We gathered large quantities of hemlock and spruce boughs for bedding, and prepared wood to keep alive our fire. This was necessary, not for warmth, but to keep the musquitos and black fliea from devouring us. Having finished our shantee, my guide, with Shack at his heels, started towards the interior of the island. This is the largest island of the Upper Saranac. I soon heard him ordering Shack to " hunt 'em up," as I have described. He returned, and we paddled quietly down the lake, to a point fifty rods below, where a low ridge terminated in a point, some distance from the line of the shore. Here we shot close under the bank, beneath the branches of a gnarled birch, that grew out almost horizontally from the rocks. It was half a mile to the main land from where we lay, and it was the narrowest part of the channel which divides the island from it. We had lain here but a few minutes, when wo CATCHING A DEER. 161 heard the bark of Shack, and presently a deer went crashing through the underwood, a short distance from us, with Shack in close and hot pursuit. Eound the island they swept, and we lost the cry of the dog in the distance. In the course of fifteen minutes, we heard him again on his return. "We heard the deer dashing through the brush, with Shack a few rods behind him. The deer passed us like the wind, and at the point behind which we lay, plunged into the lake. We wanted that deer, and giving him a few rods start, we shot out in pursuit. Before leaving our shantee, my guide had cut a long slim pole, like a fishing rod, and withing the end, formed a running noose, large enough to throw over the head of a deer, and threw it into the canoe, as we dashed from the shore. I have before described a chase after a deer in the water, and will not repeat the description here. This time, however, we were in earnest. As we ap- proached the game, my guide threw the noose of the withe over the animal's head, and pulled him, strug- gling desperately within reach, drew his hunting knife . across his throat, and in a few minutes his struggles were over. We hauled him into the canoe, and paddled back. We found Shack sitting on his 162 HILLS ANDLAKES. haunches, watching us calmly from the point, and he trotted gaily along the bank, as we floated to our landing-place by our shantee. The* evening was close and dark, save when the millions of fire-flies flashed their little torches over the water. The tree-frogs quavered vociferously all around us, and the old owl hooted mournfully from his perch in the dense foliage, as we lay down to sleep. About two o'clock in the morning I awoke, and the rain was pattering steadily on the roof of our shantee, and dripping in big drops from the leaves of the trees. It was a soothing and pleasant sound, the steady falling of the rain on our shantee, and among the dead leaves. The tree-frog had ceased his music, *nd all the wild forest notes were hushed. I glided iway into slumber again, and slept an hour later in ,he morning, than I had done before, since I entered ohe woods. My guide was up when I awoke, and busy preparing breakfast. He had, while I slept, caught some fine trout, which, with a venison steak, he was broiling on the coals. The rain was still falling steadily, the clouds were sweeping low, and wet and heavy above us before a steady but slight southern breeze, jind all around us betokened a wet, unpleasant dav. XVII. A RAINY MORNINO CLEARING UP A NEW COUNTRY. A BREED AND HIS FAMILY. WE sat after breakfast, in the morning, under the shelter of our homely roof, smoking our pipes, and listening to the small rain pattering upon our covering of bark, and the big drops rustling among the forest leaves. " A rainy day isn't a bad thing, Squire, for you and I here," said Tucker. "It gives us a resting spell, and shows us the forest in a new dress. We've worked pretty hard since we started, and want a little breathing time. To me it ain't much, for I'm used to it, and a few days travel I don't mind ; but you've been raised in a city, where people ain't used to such jaunts as this, and their timbers won't stand, at first, what mine will. You've stood it bravely, and I'll own up, that when we started, I thought I'd stretch your legs for you, in a way that would make you give 164 HILLS AND LAKES. in ; but I havn't done it, and I ain't sure that I can do it now. You seem to have a nateral way for the woods, that ain't common for the city people." " Why," said I, " Tucker, though I live in the city, and have done so for eight years, yet I was raised in the woods, and brougnt up in a region almost as wild as your own Shatagee. I remember the time when I could be sure of a deer in half an hour, from the time I left my father's door. I have caught many a one in a lake with a canoe, as we caught that one last night, and have, hundreds of times, listened to the music of my own hounds on the mountains. Beara and panthers I knew nothing about, because they did not frequent that part of the country. I remember when about the Crooked Lake, in old Steuben, was a dense wilderness, as it is about the Lower Shatagee now, and my father's log house and clearing, was the only one for fifteen miles along its shore, when we had to go eight miles for a doctor, and seven miles to a mill. If we wanted to see a neighbor, we had to travel three miles to do it, and my father's house stood at the end of the road. I am younger than you are, Tucker, and when I left that country, eight years ago, it took a pretty tough, long-legged man, to tire me out A RAINY MOENING. 165 in the woods. It's a rich farming region now, and railroads, and plank roads, and turnpikes, cross each other every few miles." " Give me your hand, Squire," he replied ; "I didn't mean to ask your history, but I'm blamed if I havn't tho't all along, that you knowed more about the woods and wild things than can be learned in a city. I don't wonder that you want to get back, once in a while, to your old friends, the trees, the lakes, and the streams, and hear the voices of the things that you heard in your young days. It makes a man young again, and brings back the old thoughts and affections of his boyhood. How curious it is to watch the growth of a country that's young and wild. I ain't talkin' now about the nations, nor governments ; I don't pretend to know anything about what larned people call the wealth of nations ; I ain't speakin 7 about the growth of commerce, or the spread of trade, or the increase of manufactered things ; but I mean a new country, where the woods stretch out every way, and are occupied only by wild animals, and may be, now and then, by a stray hunter, like old Pete Meiga and me. " Some bold-hearted Yankee marches into thxi 166 HILLS AND LAKES. woods, .with his axe on one shoulder, and his rifle on the other, and falls to choppin' down the great trees. Presently there's a spot in the forest that the sun shines down on, bright and clear. The logs and brush are burnt up, and a field of grain waves in the summer winds. After a little, you'll see a log-house, and a woman sittin' on the door-sill, with a brood of hardy, tough little ones, tumblin' about her. You'll hear the blows of an axe, as the settler battles with the tall forest trees, and you'll hear them through the day, crashin' and thunderin' to the ground. You'll hear the bark of a house dog, the cacklin' of fowls, and the quackin' of ducks and geese. You'll hear the ding-dong of a cowbell in the woods, and the tinklin' of a sheepbell along the fences. These are new sounds in the forest, and the old woods may know by them, that their time is come. Away off, may be miles away, another hardy settler puts up his cabin, and makes war on the ancient forest trees. Year after year, the woods are crowded back by the fences, till settlement meets settlement, and the old primeval things have passed away. Painted houses have suc- ceeded the log cabins ; flocks and herds, feeding in rich pastures, are everywhere seen, the sound of the CLEARING UP A NEW COUNTRY. 167 woodman's axe is still,- the crash of the fallin' trees is no longer heard, the blazing fallows, sendin' their dense smoke curlin' and wreathin 1 to the clouds, are things that have ceased to be ; for the old woods have been swept away. The ding-dong of the cowbells has died away, for the wearers of them no longer wander in the forest. Stage coaches are rushin' along the highways, and may be an ingine thunders along a railroad through the valleys. All these things I've seen in the Lower Shatagee country. I went out there last spring, and as I stood on the brow of a high hill, lookin' away off over what, when I was a boy, was one great forest, from old Champlain clear away to the St. Lawrence, I saw nothin' but great forms, and fine houses, and abundance of cattle and ? lieep. I counted ten carriages on the highways in sight at once, and I saw the long line of a railroad, t