anthem till, swelling fuller and clearer on my excited ear, it at length went over me with a sea-like roar, then died away in the far solitude. God seemed near me, there, in the fearful night, and His voice was speaking to me. How calm the sleepers around me lay in the firelight, reposing as quietly in the wild uproar, as if naught but the dews of heaven were gently distilling, and yet how helpless they appeared in their slumbers! God alone was their keeper, and I never felt more deeply the protection of that parental hand, than there at midnight.

The moon at length arose on the darkness, and the wind gradually lulled to a gentler motion. I threw myself on the ground, and watched the bright orb as it slowly mounted the heavens, with feelings I will not attempt to describe.

It was now about one o'clock, and I was endeavoring to compose myself to slumber, when there occurred one of those ludicrous incidents that makes one's romance vanish like mist, and yet derives half of its comicality from the time and circumstances in which it occurs. As my eyes were resting on the fine proportions of a young, athletic backwoodsman, who was lying near the smouldering brands on the open earth,

his head resting across a stick of wood for a pillow, and his heavy breathing telling of the profoundest slumber, I saw a rabbit steal from the bushes and cautiously approach him. With his nose close to the ground, he smelt around until he came to the sleeper's brawny hand outstretched upon the leaves. Some fragments of the johnny-cake still clinging to his thumb, deceived the rabbit into the belief that the whole digit was edible, and he put his teeth into it. This wakened the backwoodsman, who, rising to a sitting posture, looked wildly around him and then examined his thumb. All was quiet there; and imagining he had, in his dreams, thrashed his hand about and struck a splinter, he fell back, and was soon fast asleep. After waiting a proper time, the rabbit stole forth again, and creeping cautiously up to the large greasy hand, made his teeth meet through it. This roused the poor fellow with a start, and he caught a glimpse of his assailant as, with his long ears laid flat on his back, he scampered into the bushes. Kg looked a moment at the place where he had disappeared, and then at his bleeding thumb, muttering in the mean while, "There, I've ketched you at it

-now-you had better be off." The serious tone in

MISTAKE OF A RABBIT.

159

which this was said, finished me, and I went into convulsions of laughter. The look of innocent wonderthe dreadful imprecation, and the surprise and terror of the poor rabbit, crouching far away in the bushes, combined so much of the "serio-comico," that I laughed till I awoke the entire camp, who inquired what was the matter. A loud shout followed the explanation, which gradually died away into silence, as one after another dropped to sleep again. I, too, at length sunk in slumber, and was just in the midst of a sweet dream, when "crack" went a rifle, not ten yards from me, sending me to my feet with a start. The poor rabbit, however, was the only sufferer B―n, after I had thus unceremoniously roused the camp, lit his pipe, and sitting down behind a stump, watched for the rabbit. Seeing him steal cautiously forth, he had put a bullet through him, and thus ended the innocent creature's existence.

At length the welcome morning appeared, and launching our boats, we started for Cold River to take some trout.

Yours truly.

XVIII.

TROUTINGA DUCK PROTECTING HER YOUNG BY STRATAGEM-SABBATH IN THE FOREST.

LONG LAKE, Aug

DEAR H- :

I BELIEVE I broke off my last letter to go a-fishingwell the Indian and myself went ahead, hoping to surprise some deer feeding in the marshes, but were disappointed. Reaching the foot of the lake, we shot noiselessly down the Raquette River, till we came to a huge rock that rose out of the bed of the stream, when we turned off and began to ascend Cold River. When we reached it, the surface was covered with foam bubbles, made by the constant springing of the trout after flies. They had absolutely churned it up, and for awhile our hooks brought them to the surface fast-but we were too late-the sun soon rising over the forest, shed such a flood of light on the water, and

A DUCK'S STRATAGEM.

161

indeed through it, to the very bottom, that scarcely a fish could be coaxed from his hiding-place. Our boats and ourselves also threw strong shadows, sufficient to frighten less wary fish than trout. We however took enough for breakfast, and started for home. . By the way, is it not a little singular that fish should eat their own flesh; the first one we caught served as bait for the others.

As we were returning, Mitchell left the main stream and entered a narrow and shallow channel, that by making a circuitous route, reached the lake close beside the outlet. Passing silently along, we roused up a brood of ducks among the reeds. The mother first took the alarm, and seeing at a glance that she could not escape with her young, left them and fluttered out, directly ahead of our boat. She then began to make a terrible ado, striking her wings on the water, and screaming, and darting backwards and forwards, as if dreadfully wounded and could be easily picked up. I instinctively raised my 'rifle to my shoulder: then thinking the shot might frighten the deer we were after, I turned to Mitchell and inquired if I should fire. "I guess I wouldn't," he replied; "she has young ones." My gun dropped in