“I’ll just tell you what’s a fact,” said Egan, when he and the rest were getting ready to go to bed,“we’ve fallen among a lot of experts, and if we intend to keep up the good name of our section of the United States we’ve got to do some good work.”
The other boys thought so too, but they did not lose any sleep on account of it.
“Now, Curtis, bring on your moose.”
“Don’t be in a hurry. You don’t want to crowd all your sport into the first day, do you?”
“By no means. I expect to get a moose every day.”
“You mustn’t do it. It’s unlawful for one person to kill more than one moose, two caribou, and three deer in one season.”
“I wouldn’t live in such a stingy State.”
“You may have to some day. Wait until Mississippi has been overrun with greedy hunters, calling themselves sportsmen, from every part of the Union, as Maine has, and see if your lawmakers do not wake up to the necessity of protecting the little game they will leave you. If those pot-hunters were let alone, there wouldn’t be anythingfor a fellow to shoot after a while. Our laws are strict.”
“Are they always obeyed?”
“Of course not. Last winter a party of Indians camped on the headwaters of the Brokenstraw, and killed nearly a hundred moose. When the game-constables got after them, they ran over to Canada. But the worst destroyers of game are the city sportsmen. They shoot at everything that comes within range of their guns, throw away the trout they can’t eat, and the money they pay for food and guides doesn’t begin to cover the damage they do.”
It was a pleasant scene that was spread out before the gaze of Don Gordon and Walter Curtis on that bright September morning. They stood upon the brink of a high bluff jutting out into one of the Seven Ponds, which, at that day, were not as widely known among the class of men whom Walter had just been denouncing as they are at the present time. There was a hotel at the lower pond, but it was patronized only by adventurous sportsmen who, as a rule, lived up to the law, and took no more fish and game than they could dispose of. The men who are willing to endurealmost any hardship, who brave all sorts of weather and the miseries of “buck-board” traveling over corduroy roads, for the sake of spending a quiet month in the woods, are not the ones who boast of the number of fish they catch or the amount of game they kill. A hard fight with a three-pound trout, or a single deer brought down after a week’s arduous hunting, affords them more gratification than they would find in a whole creelful of “finger-lings,” or a cart-load of venison killed on the runways.
The boys were in the midst of an almost unbroken wilderness. On their right a noble forest, known only to the hardy lumberman and a few hunters and trappers, stretched away to the confines of Canada. In front was the pond (it was larger than Diamond Lake, whose sluggish waters had once floated a fleet of Union gunboats), and from the glade below them on their left arose the smoke of the fire over which some of their companions were cooking a late breakfast. A deep silence brooded over the woods, broken only by an occasional splash made by a trout as he arose to the surface of the pond to seize some unwary insect, and snatches of a plantation melody fromHopkins, who sang as he superintended the frying of the bacon:
“Big fish flutter when he done cotch de cricket;Bullfrog libely when he singin’ in de thicket;Mule get slicker when de plantin’ time ober;Colt mighty gaily when you turn him in de clover;An’ it come mighty handy to de nigger man naterWhen he soppin’ in de gravy wid a big yam ’tater!”
“Big fish flutter when he done cotch de cricket;Bullfrog libely when he singin’ in de thicket;Mule get slicker when de plantin’ time ober;Colt mighty gaily when you turn him in de clover;An’ it come mighty handy to de nigger man naterWhen he soppin’ in de gravy wid a big yam ’tater!”
“Big fish flutter when he done cotch de cricket;
Bullfrog libely when he singin’ in de thicket;
Mule get slicker when de plantin’ time ober;
Colt mighty gaily when you turn him in de clover;
An’ it come mighty handy to de nigger man nater
When he soppin’ in de gravy wid a big yam ’tater!”
The Southern boys had spent just three days in Dalton, enjoying as much sport as could be crowded into that short space of time. Everybody showed them much attention, and the fathers and mothers of the other members of the club vied with Mr. and Mrs. Curtis in their offers of hospitality. The guests were elected honorary members of the club, and hunting and fishing parties were the order of the day. Don caught his first brook-trout with the little rod whose strength he so much doubted. Bert knocked over a brace or two of ruffed grouse, and one of the club, having heard the visitors say that they didn’t know what a corn-husking was, found a farmer who had some of last year’s crop on hand, and got up one for their especial benefit. Therewas a large party of people, young and old, assembled in the barn in which the husking was done, and the Southerners, who were not at all bashful or afraid of pretty girls, had any amount of fun over the red ears of which there seemed to be an abundant supply. On Saturday there was glass-ball shooting on the grounds of the club in the presence of invited guests, and although Don Gordon did not succeed in beating the champion, he did some shooting with the rifle that made the club open their eyes. Using Curtis’s Stevens he broke all the spots out of the eight of clubs in eight consecutive shots, shooting off-hand at the distance of fifty feet and using the open sights. This was a feat that no one on the grounds had ever seen accomplished before. Even Curtis, who was the best marksman in the club, couldn’t do it, but he declared he would before he went back to the academy again.
“I tell you plainly that you’ve got a task before you,” said Don. “The best published record is five spots in five shots, using peep sights. This is the best use that can be made of playing cards. I always keep a pack of them on hand, for they are the best kind of targets.”
And that is all they are good for. If every pack of cards in the world could be shot to pieces as Don’s were, there would be less swindling going on, and we should not see so much misery around us.
Don and his friends made so many agreeable acquaintances in Dalton and so thoroughly enjoyed themselves among them, that they would have been content to pass the whole of their month there; but Curtis would not hear of it. There were only ten days more in September, he said; it would take three of them to reach their camping grounds, and if they desired to see any of the hunting and fishing that were to be found in Maine, they must start at once, for their fine fly-rods would be useless to them after the first of October. The day which closed the time for trout-fishing, opened the season for moose-hunting. If Don had revealed all that was passing in his mind, he would have said that he didn’t care a snap for hunting or fishing either. He had seen a pair of blue eyes and some golden ringlets whose fair owner gazed admiringly at the shoulder-straps he had so worthily won, and who interested him more than all the trout that ever swam or anylordly moose that ever roamed the forests. But he started for the camping-ground when the others did, submitted as patiently as he could to the jolting he was subjected to on the corduroy roads, and wondered what the girl he left behind him would think if she could see him now, dressed in a hunting suit that was decidedly the worse for the hard service it had seen, and wearing a pair of heavy boots, thickly coated with grease, and a slouch hat that had once been gray, but which had been turned to a dingy yellow by the smoke and heat of innumerable camp fires.
Their party had been increased by the addition of five of the members of the rod and gun club, but the lodge which Curtis and some of his friends had erected on the shore of one of the Seven Ponds, and which was modeled after Don Gordon’s shooting-box, was large enough to accommodate them all. It took four wagons to transport them and their luggage to the lodge, at which they arrived on the evening of the third day after leaving Dalton. They were too tired to do much that night, but they were up at the first peep of day, and after their luggage had been transferred from the wagons to the lodge, the bedsmade up in the bunks, the guns and fishing-rods hung upon the hooks that had been fastened to the walls on purpose to receive them, the canoes put into the water (they had brought three of these handy little crafts with them), a blaze started in the fire-place, the chest that contained their folding-table and camp-chairs unpacked—when these things had been done, the little rustic house, which was a marvel in its way, being constructed of poles instead of boards, began to assume an air of domesticity. The teamsters who brought them to the pond took a hasty bite and departed, leaving the club to themselves. There was no patient, painstaking old cuff with them to cook their meals and act as camp-keeper, and so the young hunters had to do their own work. The first morning the lot fell upon Hopkins and two of the Dalton boys who straightway began preparations for breakfast, while the rest strolled out to look about them, Don and Curtis bringing up on the edge of the bluff where we found them at the beginning of this chapter.
“Lean hoss nicker when de punkin’-vine spreadin’;Rabbit back his ear when de cabbage-stalk bendin’;Big owl jolly when de little bird singin’;’Possum’s gwine to climb whar de ripe ’simmons swingin’;Nigger mighty happy, ef he aint wuf a dollah,When he startin’ out a courtin’ wid a tall standin’ collah!”
“Lean hoss nicker when de punkin’-vine spreadin’;Rabbit back his ear when de cabbage-stalk bendin’;Big owl jolly when de little bird singin’;’Possum’s gwine to climb whar de ripe ’simmons swingin’;Nigger mighty happy, ef he aint wuf a dollah,When he startin’ out a courtin’ wid a tall standin’ collah!”
“Lean hoss nicker when de punkin’-vine spreadin’;
Rabbit back his ear when de cabbage-stalk bendin’;
Big owl jolly when de little bird singin’;
’Possum’s gwine to climb whar de ripe ’simmons swingin’;
Nigger mighty happy, ef he aint wuf a dollah,
When he startin’ out a courtin’ wid a tall standin’ collah!”
sang Hopkins, as he stood in the door of the lodge; and when he shouted out the last line he shook his head at Don in a way that made the latter’s face turn as red as a beet. Hopkins evidently knew where Don’s thoughts were.
“Come down from there, you two,” he exclaimed. “The bacon is done cooked.”
The cool, invigorating morning air, laden as it was with the health-giving odors of the balsam and the pine, had bestowed upon the boys an appetite that would not permit them to disregard this invitation. They hastened down the bluff, and when they entered the lodge, they found the cooks putting breakfast on the table. They sat down with the rest, and while they ate, Curtis, who was the acknowledged leader of the party, laid out a programme for the day. There were three canoes which would accommodate two boys each (they could be made to carry four, but with so many in them there would not be much elbow-room for those who wanted to fish) and two Falstaffs to be provided for. One of them wasHopkins and the other was Hutton, the boy who caught the big salmon in Canada. He would have to go, of course, for he knew all the best places in the pond, and he was certain to bring luck to the boy who went with him. Curtis thought he and Bert would look well together, while Hopkins and Farwell—the latter a light-weight Dalton boy and a clever fly-fisher—would make another good team. Don and Egan could have the other canoe to themselves.
“But we don’t know where to go or what to do,” said Egan. “You go in my place, and let me stay behind as one of the camp-keepers.”
“Iam laying out this programme,” replied Curtis, speaking in the pompous tone that Professor Odenheimer always assumed when he wanted to say something impressive.
“I know it, but I can’t be of any use to them,” continued Egan. “Some rioter, on the evening of the 23d of last July, put it out of my power to handle a paddle or a rod for some time to come.”
As Egan said this he held up his bandaged hand. His injuries were by no means so serious as everybody thought they were going to be, butstill the wounded member was not of much use to him. When he found that he was to be one of Mack’s squad, he frankly told the young officer that he could not help him; but Mack would have taken him if he had no hands at all, for he was fond of his company. He was afterward glad that he did take him, for no one could have handled the Idlewild during the pursuit with greater skill than Egan did. If they had had much walking to do Hopkins’ weak ankle would have given out; but he did full duty as a foremast hand, and proved to be of as much use as anybody.
“We don’t expect you to do any work,” said Curtis. “Let Don work, and you sit by and see the fun. Either one of the other boats will lead you to a good fishing-ground. Then all Don will have to do will be to watch Hutton or Farwell and do just as he does, and he’ll be sure to get a rise; but whether or not he will catch a trout I can’t say.”
Breakfast being over the boys paired off as Curtis had instructed, launched the canoes and paddled away, Bert and his fat mentor, Hutton, going toward the lower end of the pond, and the othersturning toward the upper end. The fish were breaking water on all sides of them, but Farwell did not stop until he and Hopkins had run their canoe into a little cove at the further end of the pond, which was fed by clear cold streams that came down from the hills.
“In warm weather this is the best fishing-ground I know of,” said he, as he beckoned Don to come alongside, “and I don’t think it is too late in the season to have a little fun here now. You see, trout like cold water, and they find plenty of it here. Now, Gordon, if you will let me see your fly-book, I will make a selection for you while you are putting your rod together.”
Don handed over the book which contained about three dozen flies that Curtis had picked out for him in Boston. He did not know the name of a single one of them, but Farwell did, and after running his eye over them he said that Don had a very good assortment.
“As it is broad daylight we want small flies,” Farwell remarked. “The sun doesn’t shine very brightly, and neither is it entirely obscured by the clouds—the weather is rather betwixt and between; so we will take a gaudy fly, like this scarletibis, for a stretcher, and a white miller for the other. Then the trout can take their choice. Now, where’s your leader—a cream-colored one. Bright and glistening ones are apt to scare the fish, and they generally fail when the pinch comes. It’s very provoking to have your leader break just about the time you are ready to slip your dip-net under a trout you have worked hard for. I hold that two flies on one line are enough. They are sometimes more than a novice wants to manage, especially when he catches a weed or a root with one hook and a trout with the other, or when two heavy fish take his flies at the same instant and run off in different directions. Three hooks on a line are allowable only when you are out of grub, and the trout don’t run over fifty to the pound. But then we don’t catch such fish in these ponds.”
The Southerners listened with all their ears and closely watched Farwell, who, while he was talking, deftly fastened the flies he had selected upon the leader, bent the leader on to the line, and was about to pass the fully equipped rod back to its owner, when a large trout shot out of the water about fifty feet away, giving them a momentaryglimpse of his gleaming sides before he fell back into his native element. Don withdrew the hand he had extended for the rod and looked at Farwell.
“Shall I take him for you and show you how it is done?” asked the latter.
“Yes,” answered all the boys, at once.
“Well, in order to do it, I shall have to throw the flies right over that swirl. What are you going to do with that paddle, Hopkins?”
“I was going to pull the canoe up nearer,” replied the latter.
“I don’t care to go any nearer.”
“Why, you can’t reach him from here,” said Egan.
“And if you hook him he will break the rod into a thousand pieces,” chimed in Don. “I know I made a mistake when I bought that flimsy little thing.”
Farwell smiled but said nothing. Grasping the rod in his right hand above the reel he drew off as much line as he thought he needed, and then threw the flexible tip smartly upward and backward, causing the flies to describe a circle around his head. One would have thought from his actionsthat he was going to strike the water with the rod, but he didn’t. When the rod reached a horizontal position it stopped there, but the flies had received an impetus that carried them onward almost to the edge of the weeds, and landed them on the water as lightly as a feather and right in the center of the swirl. It was neatly and gracefully done; but before Don and his companions could express their delight and admiration, the scarlet ibis suddenly disappeared, the line was drawn as tight as a bow-string and the pliant rod was bent almost half double. Farwell had hooked his fish, and now the fun began.
The trout fought hard but he did not break the rod as Don had predicted, and neither did the boy with whom he was battling show half as much excitement as did the others who sat by and watched the contest. They had never dreamed that there was so much sport in fishing, and there wasn’t in the way they generally fished, with a heavy pole and a line strong enough to jerk their prize from the water the moment he was hooked. Don, as we have said, had caught a few trout in the brooks about Dalton, but he had not done it in any such scientific way as this. Being distrustfulof his rod he had seized the line and lifted the fish out by main strength—a most unsportsmanlike thing to do. He closely observed all Farwell’s movements, and when at last the exhausted trout was dipped out of the water with the landing-net and deposited in the bottom of the canoe, he thought he had made himself master of the art of fly-fishing. But when he came to try casting he found he was mistaken. His flies went almost everywhere except in the direction he desired to throw them, and annoyed him by catching in his coat-tail when he tried to throw them over his head; but after patient and careful practice in making short casts he finally “got the hang of the thing,” as he expressed it, and after that he did better. The string of fish he took back to the lodge with him at noon was not a very large one, but the few he caught afforded him an abundance of sport, and that was just what he wanted.
Having gained a little insight into the art of casting the fly, Don and his friends became eager and enthusiastic fishermen. They were on the pond almost all the time, and as they tried hard to follow the instructions that were willingly and patiently given them, and would not allow themselves to become discouraged by their numerous blunders and failures, they finally became quite expert with their light tackle. They wound up the season with a glorious catch, and then oiled their rods and put them into their cases with many sighs of regret.
“Never mind,” said Curtis, soothingly. “There’s no loss without some gain, and now we will turn our attention to bigger things than speckled trout. To-night we will try this.”
As he spoke, he took from a chest something that looked like a dark-lantern with a leather helmetfastened to the bottom of it. And that was just what it was. When Curtis put the helmet on his head, the lantern stood straight up on top of it.
“This is a jack,” said he, “and it is used in fire-hunting. As soon as it grows dark some of us will get into a canoe and paddle quietly around the pond just outside of the lilies and grass. The fellow who is to do the shooting will wear this jack on his head. It will be lighted, but the slide will be turned in front of it, making it dark. When he hears a splashing in the water close in front of him he will turn on the light by throwing back the slide, and if he makes no noise about it and is quick with his gun, he will get a deer, and we shall have venison to take the place of the trout.”
This was something entirely new to the Southerners, who carefully examined the jack and listened with much interest while Curtis and his friends told stories of their experience and exploits in fire-hunting. Deer were so abundant about Rochdale that those who hunted them were not obliged to resort to devices of this kind, and in Maryland, where Hopkins lived, they were followedwith hounds and shot on the runways. Egan had never hunted deer. He devoted all his spare time to canvas-backs and red-heads. They spent the forenoon in talking of their adventures, and after dinner Bert and Hutton, who had become inseparable companions, strolled off with their double-barrels in search of grouse, and Curtis and Don pushed off in one of the canoes to make a voyage of discovery to the upper pond; the former, for the first time, taking his rifle with him. He was afterward glad that he had done so, for he made a shot before he came back that gave him something to talk about and feel good over all the rest of the year.
Don and his companion paddled leisurely along until they reached the upper end of the pond, and then the canoe was turned into the weeds, through which it was forced into a wide and deep brook communicating with another pond that lay a few miles deeper in the forest. Curtis said there was fine trapping along the banks of the brook, adding that if Don and Bert would stay and take a Thanksgiving dinner with him, as he wanted them to do, they would put out a “saple line.”
“What’s that?” asked Don.
“Nothing but a lot of traps,” replied Curtis. “When a man starts out to see what he has caught, he says he is going to make the rounds of his saple line. There are lots of mink, marten and muskrats about here, and now and then one can catch a beaver or an otter; but he’s not always sure of getting him if he does catch him, for it’s an even chance if some prowling luciver doesn’t happen along and eat him up.”
“What’s a luciver?” inquired Don.
“It’s the meanest animal we have about here, and is as cordially hated by our local trappers as the wolverine is by the trappers in the west. It’s a lynx. A full-grown one would scare you if you should happen to come suddenly upon him in the woods; and after you had killed him and taken his hide off you would feel ashamed of yourself, for you would find him to be about half as large as you thought he was. They don’t average over thirty or forty pounds—one weighing fifty would be a whopper—but they’re ugly, and would just as soon pitch into a fellow as not. I have heard some remarkable stories——”
Curtis did not finish the sentence. He stopped suddenly, looked hard at the bushes ahead of him,listening intently all the while, and finally he drew his paddle out of the water and gently poked Don in the back with the blade. When Don faced about to see what he wanted, Curtis laid his finger upon his lips, at the same time slowly and silently turning the bow of the canoe toward the nearest bank. Just then Don heard twigs snapping in front of him, the sound being followed by a slight splashing in the water as if some heavy animal were walking cautiously through it. His lips framed the question: “What is it?” and Curtis’s silent but unmistakable reply was: “Moose!”
For the first and only time in his life Don Gordon had an attack of the “buck-ague.” His nerves, usually so firm and steady, thrilled with excitement, and his hand trembled as he laid down his paddle and picked up his rifle. He had not yet obtained the smallest glimpse of the animal, but his ears told him pretty nearly where he was.
As soon as he had placed his rifle in position for a shot, Curtis gave one swift, noiseless stroke with his paddle, sending the canoe away from the bank again, and up the stream, Don trying hardto peer through the bushes, and turning his body at all sorts of angles in the hope of obtaining a view of the quarry; but the alders were thick, and he could not see a dozen yards in advance of him, until Curtis brought him to a place where the bank was comparatively clear, and then Don discovered something through a little opening in the thicket. He raised his hand, and the canoe stopped.
“That thing can’t be a moose,” thought Don, rubbing his eyes and looking again. “It’s too big, and besides it’s black.”
In twisting about on his seat to obtain a clearer view of the huge creature, whatever it was, Don accidentally touched the paddle, the handle of which slipped off the thwart and fell to the bottom of the canoe. The effect was magical. In an instant the dark, sleek body at which Don had been gazing through the opening in the bushes gave place to an immense head, crowned with enormous ears and wide-spreading palmated antlers, and a pair of gleaming eyes which seemed to be glaring straight at him. It was a savage looking head, taken altogether, but Don never took his gaze from it as his rifle rose slowly to hisshoulder. He looked through the sights for an instant, covering one of the eyes with the front bead, and pressed the trigger. The rifle cracked and so did the bushes, as the animal launched itself through them toward the bank with one convulsive spring. Their tops were violently agitated for a moment, then all was still, and Don turned about and looked at Curtis.
“You’ve got him,” said the latter, dipping his paddle into the water and sending the canoe ahead again.
“I’ve got something,” replied Don, “but it can’t be a moose.”
“What is it, then?”
“I think it is an elephant.”
Curtis laughed until the woods echoed.
“I don’t care,” said Don, doggedly. “He’s got an elephant’s ears.”
“Do an elephant’s ears stick straight out from his head, and does he carry horns?” demanded Curtis, as soon as he could speak. “Elephants don’t run wild in this country—at least I never heard of any being seen about here. It’s a moose, easy enough. I saw his horns through the alders, and I tell you they are beauties. If you were ataxidermist now, you could provide an ornament for your father’s hall or dining-room that would be worth looking at.”
It was a moose, sure enough, as the boys found when they paddled around the bushes and landed on the bank above them. There he lay, shot through the brain, and looking larger than he did when he was alive. His shape was clumsy and uncouth, but his agility must have been something wonderful; his expiring effort certainly was. He lay fully six feet from the bank, which was about five feet in height. The place where he had been feeding, which was pointed out to the boys by the muddy water and by the trampled lilies and pickerel grass, was thirty feet from the foot of the bank; so the moose, with a ball in his brain, must have cleared at least thirty-six feet at one jump. His long, slender legs did not look as though they were strong enough to support so ponderous a body, to say nothing of sending it through the air in that fashion.
“Do you know that I was afraid of him?” said Don, after he had feasted his eyes upon his prize and entered in his note-book some measurements he had made. “When he was staring at methrough those bushes, I thought I had never seen so savage a looking beast in all my life.”
“He was savage, and you had good reason to be afraid of him,” answered Curtis, quickly. “If you had wounded him he would have trampled us out of sight in the brook before we knew what hurt us. When his horns are in the velvet the moose is a timid and retiring animal; but after his antlers are fully grown, and he has sharpened and polished them by constant rubbing against the trees, he loses his fear of man and everything else, and would rather fight than eat. Now you would like to have Bert and the rest see him, I suppose. Well, if you will stay here and watch him, I will go down and bring them up. We’ll camp here to-night, for we shall have to cut the moose up before we can take him away. He’s heavy, and weighs close to seven or eight hundred pounds.”
Don agreeing to this proposition, Curtis stepped into the canoe and paddled toward the pond, not forgetting to leave the axe they had brought with them so that his companion could start a fire and build a shanty during his absence. But Don was in no hurry to go to work. He was so highlyelated at his success that he could not bring his mind down to anything. For a long time he sat on the ground beside the moose, wondering at his gigantic proportions and verifying the measurements he had taken, and it was not until he heard voices in the brook below him that he jumped to his feet and caught up the axe. He had a cheerful fire going when his friends arrived, but there were no signs of a shanty.
“Look here,” shouted Bert, as he drew his canoe broadside to the bank. “You were good, enough to keep your moose until we could have a look at him, and so I brought my trophies along. You needn’t think you are the only one who has gained honors to-day. What do you think ofthat?”
As Bert said this, he and Hutton lifted a queer looking animal from the bottom of the canoe and threw it upon the bank. It was about as large as an ordinary dog, rather short and strongly built, with sharp, tufted ears and feet that were thickly padded with fur. Its claws were long and sharp, and so were the teeth that could be seen under its upraised lip. Its back was slightly arched, and as it lay there on the bank it looked a good deallike an overgrown cat that was about to go into battle. Don had never seen anything like it before.
“What in the world is it?” he exclaimed.
“That’s just the question I asked myself when I stumbled on him and his mate a little while ago,” said Bert. “It’s a luciver.”
“Here’s the other,” cried Curtis; and a second lynx, somewhat smaller than the first, was tossed ashore. “It’s the greatest wonder to me that they didn’t make mince-meat of Bert, and I believe they would have done it if he hadn’t been so handy with that pop-gun of his.”
“Well, that pop-gun had proved itself to be a pretty good shooter,” returned Bert, complacently. “You see, Don, I was beating a coppice in which Hutton told me I would be likely to flush a grouse or two, and Hutton himself was on the other side of the ridge. All on a sudden I felt a thrill run all through me, and there right in front of me, and not more than ten feet away, was this big lynx. Of course he heard me coming, but as he was making a meal off a grouse he had just killed, he didn’t want to leave it. He humped up his back, spread out his claws, showed his teethandspitjust like a cat; and believing that he was going to jump at me, I knocked him over, giving him a charge of number eight shot full in the face. It killed him so dead that he never stirred out of his tracks, but he looked so ugly that I was afraid to approach him. While I was thinking about it, I happened to cast my eyes a little to the right, and there was his mate looking at me over a log. I gave him the other barrel, and he came for me.”
“Good gracious!” exclaimed Don, looking first at his brother’s slender figure and then at the dead luciver’s strong teeth and claws. Bert was too frail to make much of a fight against such weapons as those.
“But the luciver didn’t get him,” chimed in Hutton, “although he made things lively for him for a little while. I heard the rumpus, and knowing that Bert had got into trouble, I ran over the ridge to take a hand in it. When I got into the thicket there was Bert, making good time around trees, over logs and behind stumps, and the luciver was close at his heels, following him by scent and hearing, as I afterward learned, and not by sight, for Bert’s shot had blinded him. While I waswatching for a chance to fire at him, Bert, who was trying his best to load his gun as he ran, managed to shove in a cartridge, and after that the matter was quickly settled.”
“Don got the moose, but I had the excitement,” added Bert.
The young hunters ate a hearty supper that night, but they slept well after it, for they did not go to bed till they had cut up the moose, and hung the quarters out of reach of any prowling lucivu that might happen to come that way. The habits of this animal and those of the moose afforded them topics for conversation long after they sought their blankets, and the sun arose before they did.
Stowing the heavy carcass in their cranky little canoes and transporting it to the lodge occupied the better portion of the day, but they were not too tired to await the return of the fire-hunters, who set out at dark in quest of deer. They returned at midnight and reported that they had “shone the eyes” of two which they could have shot if they had been so disposed; but being sportsmen instead of butchers they could not see any sense in shooting game they could not use.About the time they began to look for the teamsters, who had been engaged to return on a certain day and carry them and their luggage back to Dalton, they would begin fire-hunting in earnest, and procure a supply of venison for the club-dinner, which was to be eaten before the Southern boys went home.
The days passed rapidly, and every one brought with it some agreeable occupation. Curtis and the other Dalton boys took care to see that the time did not hang heavily upon the hands of the guests, and were always thinking up something new for them. The teamsters came as they promised, and found four fine deer waiting for them. The next morning the wagons were loaded, the foremost one being crowned by the antlers of Don’s moose, to show the people along the road that one of their number had gained renown while they had been in the woods, and the homeward journey was begun.
If time would permit we might tell of some interesting incidents that happened in connection with the club dinner, which came off on the evening of the last day that Don and his companions spent in Dalton. To quote from some of the boyswho sat down to it, “the spread was fine,” so were the toasts, speeches and songs, and Don Gordon had abundant opportunity to talk to the owner of the eyes and the curls that had haunted him every day of the long month he spent at the lodge. He would have been glad to stay in Dalton always. He said he was coming back, but the excuse he gave was that he wanted another trial at glass-balls with the champion. Perhaps his friends believed that that was his only reason for desiring to return, and perhaps they didn’t. At any rate they looked very wise, and exchanged many a significant wink with one another.
“Good by, boys,” said Egan, when the stage-coach drew up in front of Mr. Curtis’s door the next morning. “We are indebted to you for a splendid time, and we should like a chance to reciprocate. Curtis is going to spend a month with me next fall, and I should be delighted to have you come with him. Don, Bert and Hop will be there too, and we’ll make it as pleasant as we can for you.”
The Southern boys separated in Boston and took their way toward their respective homes, Don and Bert stopping in Cincinnati long enough topurchase a couple of revolving-traps and a supply of glass-balls, and reaching Rochdale in due time without any mishap. Their shoulder-straps created all the surprise that Don could have desired, and the latter knew by the way his mother kissed him that she was entirely satisfied with the way he had conducted himself during his last year at school. They never grew weary of talking about the fine times they had enjoyed at the lodge, and Don gave everybody to understand that he was going back to Dalton some day on purpose to win that medal from the champion. He had a right to compete for it now, for he was a member of the club.
“But you will have to win it three times before you can bring it home with you,” said Bert.
“So much the better,” answered Don, “for then I can see that handsome little—ah! I mean the lodge, you know.”
“Yes, I know,” said Bert, dryly.
“By the way, has anybody heard anything of Lester Brigham and Jones and Williams?” exclaimed Don, anxious to change the subject.
Yes, everybody had heard of them. Mr. Brigham had been industriously circulating the articlesand papers that Lester had sent him, and had celebrated his son’s return by giving a big supper and a party. The house was crowded, and Lester and Enoch were lionized to their hearts’ content.
Don and Bert spent a portion of their next vacation at the homes of Egan and Hopkins as they had promised, seeing no end of sport and some little excitement. What they did for amusement, and what Lester and his enemies did when they returned to Bridgeport in January, shall be narrated in the third and concluding volume of this series, which will be entitled: “The Young Wild-Fowlers.”
THE END.