University of Virginia Library

8. CHAPTER VIII.

When Claud Elwood reached home, on the eventful visit to
the Magalloway which resulted in the exchange of vows between
him and Avis Gurley, as intimated at the close of the
last chapter, he at once suspected, from the sad and troubled
looks of his mother and the disturbed manner of his father,
that the secret of his late visits abroad, as well as of the unexpected
advent of the family visited, had, in some way, become
known to them in his absence. A feeling of mingled delicacy
and self-condemnation, however, prevented him from making
any inquiries; and, with a commonplace remark, which was
received in silence, he took a seat, and, with much inward
trembling, awaited the expected denouement. But it did not
come so soon nor in so harsh terms as he expected. There are
occasions when we feel so deeply that we are reluctant to begin
the task of unburdening our minds; and, when we do speak out,
it is oftener in sorrow than in anger. It was so in the present
instance. Mr. Elwood had that day been abroad among the
settlers, and, for the first time, learned not only that Gaut
Gurley had moved with his family into the settlement, but that
Claud was courting his daughter, and a match already settled
on between them. On his return home, Elwood felt almost as
much reluctance in making known his discoveries to his wife as
Claud had before him; for he well knew how deeply they
would disquiet her. But, soon concluding there would be no

wisdom in attempting concealment, he told her what he had
heard. As he had anticipated, the news fell like a sudden
thunderclap on her heart. She had experienced, indeed,
many strange misgivings respecting her son's late mysterious
absences; but she was not prepared for such a double portion
of ill-omened news as she deemed this to be, and it struck her
mute with dismay, for it at once brought a cloud over the
future, which to her eye was dark with portents. Elwood himself
was also obviously considerably disquieted by the news,
showing no little uneasiness and excitement, — an excitement,
perhaps, resembling that which is said to be manifested by a
bird in the presence of the devouring reptile. He doubtless
would gladly have been relieved from any further connection
with Gaut. He doubtless would gladly have avoided even the
slightest renewal of their former acquaintance. But, for reasons
which he had never disclosed, he felt confident he should not
long be suffered to enjoy any such exemption. And feeling,
for the same reasons, how weak he should be in the hands of
that man, he was troubled, far more troubled than he would
have been willing to own, at the discoveries of the day, even if
that part of it relating to the intimacy of his son and Gaut's
daughter should prove, as he believed, a mere conjecture.

It was at this juncture, and before a word of comment had
been offered either by Mrs. Elwood or her husband on the
news he had related, that Claud arrived and entered the room.

“Well, God's will be done!” sadly uttered Mrs. Elwood,
at length breaking the embarrassing silence, but without raising
her eyes from her work, which lay neglected in her lap.

“What does mother mean?” doubtfully asked Claud, turning
to his father.

“I have been telling her some unexpected news, which
greatly disturbs her mind, — more than is necessary, perhaps,”
replied the other, with poorly assumed indifference.

“What news?” rejoined the son, having made up his mind

that, if his own secret was involved, as he supposed, the long
dreaded eclaircissement might as well come now as ever.

“Why, that Gaut Gurley has moved with his family into
the settlement. And that is not all; but the rest of it, which
relates to a lately-formed intimacy between you and Gaut's
daughter, I presume is mere guess-work.”

Mrs. Elwood turned a searching glance to the face of her
son, and waited to hear his reply to the last remarks, but he
was silent; and the last gleam of hope, which had for the
moment lighted up the mother's countenance, faded like a
moon-beam on the edge of an eclipsing cloud; and, after a long
pause and silence which no one interrupted, she slowly and
sadly said:

“When I consented to leave the comforts and social blessings
to which I had been accustomed, and come into this lone
wilderness, with its well-known hardships and privations, my
great and indeed only motive was, to see my family placed
beyond the temptations of the city, and especially beyond the
fatal, and to me always mysterious, influence of that wicked
and dangerous man, Gaut Gurley. And with this object I
came cheerfully, gladly. And when I reached this place,
fondly hoping and believing we had escaped that man, and
were forever secure from his wiles, I became happy,— happier
than since I left my native hills in New-Hampshire. It soon
became to me, lone and dreary as it might appear to others, —
it soon became to me, in my fancied security from the evils we
had fled, a second Paradise. But to me it is a Paradise no
longer; the Serpent has found his way into our Eden; and,
not content with having beguiled and ruined one, must now
have the other so entangled in the toils that both will be kept
in his power.”

“You are going a great ways to borrow trouble, it appears to
me, Alice,” remarked Elwood, after a pause.

“It certainly seems so to me, also, mother,” said Claud. “You
cannot know but Gurley comes here with as honest purposes

as father. But, were it otherwise, the daughter should not be
held responsible for the faults of the father, nor, without good
reason, be accused of favoring any sinister designs he may
entertain.”

“Claud takes a just view of the case, on both points, I presume,”
rejoined Mr. Elwood. “As to Gurley, I know not
how, or why, he came here; nor do I wish or expect to have
any thing to do with him. And as to Claud, I trust he knows
enough to take care of himself.”

“You have both evaded the spirit of my remarks,” responded
Mrs. Elwood. “When I speak of Gaut Gurley's motives
and designs, you must know I judge from his past conduct.
Have either of you as safe grounds of judging him? And
when I allude to his daughter, I do so with no thought of holding
her amenable for the faults of her father, or even of assuming
the ground that she has inherited any of his objectionable
traits of character. I intend nothing of the kind, for I
know nothing of her. But I do say, that, whenever she marries,
she becomes the connecting link between her husband and
her father, the chain extending both ways, so as to bind their
respective families together, and give one the power and means
of evil which could in no other way be obtained. In view of
all these circumstances, then, I feel that a calamity is in store
for us. God grant that my fears and forebodings may prove
groundless.”

The husband and son were saved the difficult and embarrassing
task of replying, by the arrival of Philips, who, in
his free and easy manner, entired and took a seat with the
family.

“I came, gentlefolks,” said the hunter, after a few commonplace
remarks had been exchanged, — “I came to see if you
know what a `bee' means?”

“A bee? what, honey-bees?” asked Mr. Elwood, in surprise
at the oddness of the question.

“No, not a honey-bee, exactly, or a humble-bee, but a sort of

work-meeting of men or women, to help a neighbor to husk his
corn, for instance, build him a log house, or do off some other job
for him in a day, which alone would take him perhaps weeks.
These turn-outs we new settlers call `bees.' Nothing is more
common than for a man to get up a bee to knock off at once a
pressing job he wants done. And, when a new-comer appears
to be delicate about moving in the matter, the neighbors sometimes
volunteer, and get up a bee for him, among themselves.”

“I may have heard of the custom; but why do you say you
came to ask me if I know any thing about it?”

“Well, I kinder thought I would. You have a pretty stiff-looking
burnt piece here to be logged off soon, have you not?”

“Why, yes.”

“And it would be a hard and heavy month's job for you
and the young man to do it, would it not?”

“The best part of a month, perhaps; but I was intending to
go at it in season, that we might get it all cleared and sown
by the middle of September; which must be done, if I join you
and the rest of the usual company in the fall trapping and
hunting expedition.”

“Of course you will join us. It is our main and almost only
chance here of getting any money.”

“So I have always understood, and therefore made up my
mind to go into it, if I can get ready. I have been down the
river to-day and engaged my seed wheat. To-morrow I
thought of going abroad again, to try to engage some help for
clearing the piece.”

“Well, you need not go a rod for that purpose.”

“Why not?”

“Because we have got up a bee for you in the settlement,
large enough, we think, to log off your whole piece in a day.”

“Indeed! Who has been so kind as to start such a project?”

“Several of us: Codman, that you may have seen, or at
least heard of, as the best trapper in the settlement, took upon

himself to enlist those round the southerly end of the lake,
where he lives; and I have arranged matters a little in this
section and on the river below. But, in justice, I should name,
as the man who has taken the most interest in the movement,
the new settler who has this summer come into the parts, and
made his pitch over on the Magalloway. His name is Gurley.”

A dead silence of several minutes ensued, during which Mrs.
Elwood looked sadly and meaningly from the husband to the
son, both of whose countenances seemed to fall and shrink before
her significant glances.

“Well,” at length resumed the hunter, perceiving no response
was to be made to his last remark, “seeing we had
got all arranged and ready, I came to notify you, so that you
should not be taken by surprise. We propose to be on the
ground, men and oxen, early day after to-morrow. There will
be fifteen or twenty of us, perhaps, with five or six yoke of
oxen, and like enough a stiff horse or two.”

“But how can I provision such a company on so short
notice?”

“No trouble about that. You have salt pork?”

“A good supply.”

“Corn meal?”

“Yes; and wheat flour, with fine new potatoes.”

“All right. I will take care of the rest. I will take the young
man, here, into my largest canoe, to-morrow morning, if he be so
disposed, and we will go up the lake, perhaps into the upper lake,
and it will be a strange case if we don't return at night with fish,
and I think flesh, enough to victual the company; and, in the
mean time, my women will come up and be on hand to-morrow
and next day, to help Mrs. Elwood do the baking and cooking.”

The friendly movement of the neighbors, thus announced,
was not, of course, to be opposed or questioned by those for
whose benefit it was intended, any further than Mr. Elwood
had done in relation to his ability to entertain the company so
well as their kindness deserved. Mr. Elwood and his son,

indeed, who had been dreading the hard job of clearing off
their land, were greatly gratified at the unexpected kindness.
And even Mrs. Elwood, pained and annoyed as she was by
the part taken by Gaut Gurley, whose only motive she believed
was to gain some advantage for meditated evil, entered cheerfully
into the affair, and joined her husband in handsome expressions
of acknowledgment to the hunter, and assurances of
doing their best to provide properly for the company. The
matter was therefore considered as settled; and the hunter
departed, to call, as he had proposed, early the next morning
for Claud, for an excursion up the lake, to procure fresh provissions
for the coming occasion.

The family were early astir the next morning, intent on their
respective duties in preparation for the appointed logging bee.
They had scarcely dispatched their breakfast, before the hunter,
as he had promised, called for Claud; when the two departed
together, with their guns and fishing gear, for the lake, whither
we propose to accompany them.

“Well, now, let us settle the order of the day,” said Phillips,
after they had reached the landing and deposited their luggage
in the canoe selected for the purpose.

“I am a companion of the voyage, to-day, and, as you know,
but a learner in these sports,” responded Claud. “You have
but to name your plan.”

“Well, my plan is this: to steer across and get up the lake
to the inlet and rapids which connect this to the next upper
lake, called by the Indians the Molechunk-a-munk; up these
rapids into that lake, where we will take a row of a few hours,
and home again by nightfall. In these rapids, going or returning,
we may safely count, at this season, on a plenty of trout;
and, on the borders of the lake beyond, I know of several
favorite haunts of the deer, one of which I propose to take into
the canoe as ballast to steady it for running the rapids, on our
way back.”

“What is the whole distance?”

“Four or five miles of this lake, as many of the river or
rapids, and as far into the upper lake as we please.”

“You are laying out largely for one day, are you not?”

“No, 'tis nothing. You see, I have brought round for our
use my best birch bark canoe. I have rowed her fifty miles a
day round the lakes many a time. We shall bound over the
lake in almost no time, and the rapids, which are the only drawback,
can soon be surmounted, by oar or setting-pole, or, what
may be cheapest, carrying the canoe round those most difficult
of passage. The boat does not weigh an hundred. I could
travel with it a mile on my head, as fast as you would wish to
walk without a pound of luggage. So, in with you, and I'll
show you how it is done.”

Accordingly they launched forth in their primitive craft,
which, as before intimated, was the once noted birch bark canoe
built by the hunter agreeably to the exact rules of Indian art.
Few, who have never seen and observed the process of constructing
this canoe, which, for thousands of years before the
advent of the white man, was the only craft used by the aborigines
in navigating the interior waters, have any idea how,
from such seemingly fragile materials, and with no other tools
than a hatchet, knife, and perhaps a bone needle, the Indian
can construct a canoe so extremely light and at the same time
so tough and durable. In building his canoe, which is one of
the greatest efforts of his mechanical skill, the Indian goes to
work systematically. He first peels his bark from a middle-sized
birch tree, and cuts it in strips five or six inches wide,
and twelve, fifteen, or twenty feet long, according to the length
and size of the designed canoe. He then dries them thoroughly
in the sun, after which he nicely scrapes and smooths off the
outside. He next proceeds to soak these strips, which are thus
made to go through a sort of tanning process, to render them
tough and pliable, as well as to obviate their liability to crack
by exposure to the sun. After the materials are thus prepared,
he smooths off a level piece of ground, and drives around the

outside a line of strong stakes, so that the space within shall
describe the exact form of the boat in contemplation. Inside
of these stakes he places and braces up the wet and pliable
pieces of bark, beginning at the bottom and building up and
bending into form the sides and ends, till the structure has attained
the required height. In this situation it is left till it is
again thoroughly dried and all the pieces become fixed in shape.
A light inside framework is then constructed, resembling the
skeleton of a fish, and of dimensions to fit the canoe already
put in form in the manner we have described. The pieces of
cured material are then numbered and taken down; when the
architect, beginning at the bottom, lapping and sewing together
the different pieces, proceeds patiently in his work, till the
sides are built, the ends closed nicely up, and each piece lashed
firmly to the framework, which, though of surprising lightness,
is made to serve as keel, knees, and ribs of the boat. Every
seam and crevice is then filled with melted pitch. The Indian
then has his canoe fit for use; and he may well boast of a
boat, which, for combined strength and lightness, and especially
for capacity of burden, no art of the shipbuilder has ever been
able to surpass, and which, if it has not already, might serve
for a model of the best lifeboat ever constructed, in these days
of boasted perfection in marine arts and improvements.

Bounding over the smooth waters like a seabird half on
wing, our voyagers soon found themselves on the northerly
side of the lake; when, rounding a point, they began to skirt
the easterly shore of the bay that makes up to the inlet, at a
more leisurely pace, for the purpose of being on the lookout
for deer, which might be standing in the edge of the water
round the coves, to cool themselves and keep off the flies. Not
seeing any signs of game, however, they steered out so as to
clear the various little capes or woody points of land inclosing
the numerous coves scattered along the indented shore, and
struck a line for the great inlet at the head of the lake, which
they now soon reached, and commenced rowing against the

at first gentle and then rapid current, which here pours down
from the upper lakes, through the rocky and picturesque defiles,
in the form of a magnificent river, rivalling in its size the
midway portions of the Connecticut or Hudson.

“Now, young man,” said the hunter, laying aside his paddle
and taking up the strong, elastic setting-pole he had provided
for the occasion, “now you must look out for your balance.
The river, to be sure, is quite low, and the current, of course,
at its feeblest point; but we shall find places enough within
the next mile where the canoe, to go up at all, must go up like
the jump of a catamount. So, down in the bottom of the boat,
on your braced knees, with your haunches on your heels, and
leave all to me.”

“What! do you expect to force the canoe up rapids like
these?” asked Claud, in surprise, as he cast his eye over the
long reach of eddying, tumbling waters, that looked like a lessening
sheet of foam as it lay stretched upward in the distant
perspective.

“I expect to try,” coolly replied the hunter; “and, if you
lay asleep in the bottom of the canoe, I should expect to succeed.
And, as it is, if you can keep cool and obey orders, we
will see what can be done.”

Claud implicitly obeyed the directions of the hunter, without
much faith, however, in the success of his bold attempt. But
he soon perceived he had underrated the skill and strength of
arm which had been relied on to accomplish the seemingly
impossible feat. Standing upright and slightly bracing in the
bottom of his canoe, the hunter first marked out with his eye
his course through a given reach of the rock-broken and foaming
waters above; then, nicely calculating the resisting force
of each rapid to be overcome, and the required impetus, and
the direction to be given to his canoe to effect it, he sharply bid
Claud be on his guard, and sent the light craft like an arrow
into the boiling eddies before him. And now, by sudden and
powerful shoves, he was seen shooting obliquely up one rapid;

tacking with the quickness of light, and darting off zigzag
among the rocks and eddies towards another, which was in turn
surmounted; while the boat was forced, surging and bounding
forward, with increasing impetus, now up and now athwart the
rushing currents, till he had gained a resting-place in the still
water of some sheltering boulder in the stream, when he would
mark off, with a rapid glance, another reach of falls, and shoot
in among them as before. Thus, with the quick tacks and
turns and sudden leaps of the ascending salmon, and almost
with the celerity, he made his way up the long succession of
rapids, until the last of the series was overcome, and he found
himself safely emerging into the smooth waters of the beautiful
lakelet or pond which divides, in the upper portion of its
course, this remarkable stream. Another row of a mile or so
now brought the voyagers where the water again took the form
of a swift river, tumbling and foaming over the rocks, in the
last series of rapids to be overcome. These also were surmounted
in the same manner and with the same success as the
former.

But this part of the voyage was marked with an unexpected
adventure, and one which seemed destined to lead to the operation
of new and singular moral agencies, both in the near and
more distant future, having an important bearing on the fate
and fortunes of young Elwood. They had reached the last
and most difficult of all the rapids yet encountered, and were
resting, preparatory to the anticipated struggle, in a smooth
piece of water under the lee of a huge rock, on either side of
which the divided stream rushed in two foam-covered torrents,
with the force and swiftness of a mill-race; when they were
startled by the shrill exclamations of a female voice, in tones
indicative of surprise and alarm. The sounds, which came
from some unseen point not far above them in the stream,
were evidently drawing near at a rapid rate. Presently a
small Indian canoe, with a single female occupant, whose youth
and beauty, even in the distance, were apparent, shot swiftly

into view, and came tossing and whirling down the stream, unguided,
and wholly at the mercy of the crooked and raging
currents along which it was borne with the speed of the wind.
The imperilled maiden uttered a cry of joy at the appearance
of our voyagers, and held up the handle of a broken oar, to
indicate to them at once the cause of her fearful dilemma and
need of assistance.

“I will throw her one of our paddles, and she will best take
care of herself,” hurriedly exclaimed the hunter, seizing the
implement, and awaiting her nearest approach to throw it
within her reach.

The critical point was the next instant reached, but the
hunter, in his nervous anxiety and haste, made his throw a little
too soon and with too much force. The paddle struck directly
under the prow of the canoe, and shot beyond, far out of
reach of the expectant maiden's extended hands. Another
oar was hurled after her, with no better effect; when, for the
first time, a shade of despair passed over her agitated countenance;
for she saw herself rapidly drifting directly into the jaws
of a wild and fearful labyrinth of breakers not fifty yards below,
where, in all probability, her fragile canoe would be dashed to
pieces, and herself thrown against the slippery and jagged
rock, drawn down, and lost. Claud, who had witnessed, with
trembling anxiety, the hunter's vain attempts to place the means
of self-preservation in the hands of the maiden, and who now
perceived, in their full light, the perils of the path to which she
was helplessly hastening, could restrain his generous impulses
no longer; and, quickly throwing off his hat and coat, he leaped
overboard, dashed headlong into the current, and struck boldly
down it to overtake the receding canoe.

“Hold! madness! They will both perish together!”
rapidly exclaimed the hunter, surprised and alarmed at the rash
attempt of his young companion. “But I will share in their
dangers, — perhaps save them, yet.”

Accordingly he hastily headed round his canoe, and, hazardous

as he knew must be the experiment, sent it surging
down the current after his endangered young friends; for the
one, as will soon appear, was no less his favorite than the
other. In the mean time, Claud, in swimming over a sunken
rock, luckily gained a foothold, which enabled him to rise and
plunge forward again with redoubled speed; and, so well-timed
and powerful were his exertions, that he came within reach of
the stern of the fugitive canoe just as it was whirling round
sideways in the reflux of the waves caused by the water dashing
against a high rock standing partly in the current. It was
a moment of life or death, both to the man and maiden; for
the boat was on the point of going broadside over the first fall
into the wild and seething waters, seen leaping and roaring in
whirlpools and jets of foam among the intricate passes of the
ragged rocks below. Making sure of his grasp on the end of
the canoe that had been thus fortunately thrown within his
reach, the struggling Claud made an effort to draw it from the
edge of the abyss into which it was about to be precipitated;
but, with his most desperate exertions, he was barely enabled
to keep it in position, while his strength was rapidly giving
way. The unequal contest was quickly noticed by the hapless
girl; and, after watching a moment, with a troubled eye, the
fruitless efforts and wasting strength of the young man, she
calmly rose to her feet, exhibiting, as she stood upright in the
boat, with the spray dashing over her marble forehead and
long flowing hair, in the faultless symmetry of her person, the
beautiful cast of her features, and the touching eloquence of
her speaking countenance, a figure which might well serve as a
subject for the pencil of the artist.

“Let go, brave stranger,” she cried, in clear, silvery tones,
after throwing a grateful and admiring glance down upon her
gallant rescuer; “let me go, and save yourself. I can die as
befits a daughter of my people.”

“Hold on, there, Claud! Courage, girl! I see a way to
save you both,” at that critical instant rang above the roar of

the waters the sharp voice of the hunter, who, with wonderful
tact and celerity, had shot down obliquely across the main
current, out of it through a narrow side pass, down that and
round the intervening rocks, and was now driving with main
strength up another pass, abreast of the objects of his anxiety.
“There: now seize the head of my canoe, and hold on to both;
and, on your life, be quick!” he continued, shouting to the exhausted
young man, while he himself was struggling with all
his might to get and keep his boat in the right position among
the battling currents.

After one or two ineffectual attempts, Claud, with a last desperate
effort, fortunately succeeded in securing his grasp on the
hunter's boat, without losing his hold on the other; when, with
one mighty effort of the latter, they were all drawn out of the
vortex together, and soon brought safely to shore.

“Fluella, my fair young friend,” said the hunter, taking a
long breath, and respectfully turning to the rescued girl, as
the party stepped on to the dry beach, “I have not often — no,
never — felt more rejoiced than now, in seeing you stand here in
safety.”

“I know the danger I have been in,” responded the maiden,
feelingly. “O yes, know to remember, and know to remember,
also, those who made my escape. Mr. Phillips, I am grateful
much.”

“Don't thank me,” promptly replied the hunter. “I am
ashamed not to have been the first in the rescue, when the
chief's daughter was in danger.”

“But, Mr. Phillips,” rejoined the other, with an expressive
smile, “you have not told me who this stranger is, who seemed
to measure the value of his own life by such a worthless thing
as mine.”

“True, no,” returned the hunter; “but this gentleman, Fluella,
is young Mr. Claud Elwood, who, with his father and
mother, has recently moved into the settlement; and they are
now my nearest neighbors, at the foot of the lower lake. And

to you, Claud, I have to say, that this young lady is the daughter
of Wenongonet, the red chief, the original lord of these
lakes, and still living on the one next above.”

Both the maiden and her gallant young preserver seemed
equally surprised, at the announcement of each others' name and
character: the former, because it suggested questions in the
solution of which she felt an interest, but which, with the characteristic
prudence of her race, she forbore to ask; and the latter,
because he found it hard to realize that the fair-complexioned
and every way beautiful girl, who stood before him, readily speaking
his own language, and neatly and even richly arrayed in the
usual female habiliments of the day, with the single exception
of the gay, beaded moccasins, that enveloped her small feet and
ankles, — found it extremely difficult to realize that one of such
an exterior, and of so much evident culture, could possibly have
descended from the tawny and uncultivated sons of the forest.

“You two should hereafter be friends, should you not?”
observed the hunter, perceiving their mutual restraint, of which
he wished to relieve them.

Rousing himself, with a prompt affirmative reply to the question,
Claud gallantly advanced, and extended his hand to his
fair companion, who, with evident emotion, and a slight suffusion
of the cheek, gave him her own in return, as she said:

“O yes. Mr. Phillips' friend is my friend, and, I — I —
why, I can't thank him now; the words don't come; the thanks
remain unshaped in my heart.”

“Excuse me,” replied Claud, “excuse me if I say, Miss
Fluella, as Mr. Phillips calls you, that you have already expressed,
and in the finest terms, far more than I am entitled to;
so let that pass, and tell us how your mishap occurred?”

“O, naturally enough, though rather stupidly,” responded
the other, regaining her ease and usually animated manner.
“You must know that I sometimes play the Indian girl, in
doing my father's trouting. And, having rowed down to the
rapids this morning for that purpose, I ran my canoe on to a

rock, up here at the head of the falls, and threw into an eddy
below, till I had taken a supply. But, like other folks, I must
have the one more, — a large one I had seen playing round my
hook; and, in my eagerness to take him, I did not notice that my
canoe had slipped off the rock till I found it drifting down the
current. I seized my oar, but, with the first blow in the water
it snapt in my hands. You know the rest, unless, perhaps, the
number of fish I caught,” she added, pointing to a string of fine
trout still lying safely in the bottom of her canoe.

“Brave girl!” exclaimed the hunter, going up to the boat
with Claud, to inspect the fish, which they had not before noticed.
“A good ten pounds, and fine ones, too. Claud shall
remain here while I go a piece up the lake for a deer, and follow
your example, except the race down the rapids; but that
he can't do, for I shall take our canoe with me, and make him
fish from the shore, which will be just as well. Are you agreed
to that arrangement, young man?”

This proposition being accepted, and it being also settled by
common consent that no further attempt should, at this time, be
made to ascend the remaining rapids with either of the boats
the hunter and Claud, accompanied by the light-footed Fluella,
took up her canoe and set off with it, along shore, towards a
convenient landing in the lake above, then not more than sixty
or seventy rods distant. In a short time the proposed landing
was reached, and the boat let down into the water. The
maiden, with an easy and sprightly movement, then flung herself
into her seat, and, with a paddle hastily whittled for her out
of a piece of drift-wood, by the ever ready hunter, sent her little
craft in a curving sweep into the lake; when, facing round to
her preservers, while a sweet and grateful smile broke over her
dimpling features, she bade and bowed them adieu, and went
bounding over the undulating waves towards her home, on an
island some miles distant, near the southeastern border of this
romantie sheet of water.

“Can it be,” half-soliloquized Claud, as he stood rivetting his

wondering gaze on the beauteous figure, which, gracefully bowing
with the lightly-dipping oar, was receding from his rapt
view, and gradually melting away in the distance; “can it be
that she is but a mere Indian girl, one of those wild, untutored
children of the forest?”

“It is even so, young man,” responded the hunter, rousing
himself from the reverie into which he also seemed to have
fallen at the departure of his fair favorite; “it is even so; but,
for all that, the very flower of all the womankind, white or red,
according to my ideas, that ever graced the borders of these
lakes.”

“But how came she by those neatly-turned English features,
and that clear, white complexion?”

“Why, her mother, who is now dead, was an uncommon
handsome woman for a squaw, and had, as I perhaps should
have qualified when I answered so about this girl, some white
blood in her veins; or rather had, as the old chief once told me,
somewhere away back among the gone-by generations, a female
ancestor, a pure white woman, who was made captive by the
Indians, and married into their tribe, and who was as handsome
as a picture. But the white blood seemed to have been pretty
much lost among the descendants, till the appearance of this
nonsuch of a girl, in whom every drop of it seemed to have again
been collected.”

“Some might, perhaps, draw different conclusions in the
case.”

“Yes, and draw them very wrongfully, too, as I have no
doubt many people do in such cases; for I have often noticed
it among families, and ascertained it as a fact, that where a
person of particular looks and character once lived, his or her
like, though not coming out visibly in any of the descendants for
a long time, is sure sooner or later to appear, and so will frequently
leap out in a child four or five generations off; a complete
copy, in looks, blood, and character, of the original (as far
as can be judged from family tradition), who may have been

dead an hundred years. This is my notion; and I hold that
every person is destined to be at least once reproduced among
some of his descendants. I, or the exact like of me, will
likely enough be seen in some of my blood descendants, fifty or
an hundred years hence, building dams or mills on these very
falls, or even riding in a carriage around these wild lakes, where
I have spent nearly my whole life in hunting moose, and the
other wild animals known only in the unbroken forest.”

“Your theory may be true, but it does not quite account, I
think, for the evident intelligence and culture of this remarkable
girl. To appear and converse as she does, she must have seen
considerable of good society out of the forest, and, I should
think, schools.”

“She has, both. Her father, one fall, when she was a girl of
ten or eleven, took her along with him to a city on the coast,
where he went to sell his furs and nice basket-work, and where
she, some how, excited the lively interest of a good family, and
particularly of a wealthy gentleman then living in the family.
Well, the short of the matter is, that they persuaded the chief
to leave her through the winter; and, she becoming a favorite
with them all, they instructed her, sent her to school, and
dressed her as they would an own daughter, and would only
part with her in the spring on condition of her returning in the
fall. And so it has gone on till now, she living with them winters,
and here with her father summers; for, though they would
like to take her entirely out of the woods, she would not desert
her father, who loves her as his life, and calls her the light of
his lodge, — no, not for all the gold in the cities.”

“You must then be well acquainted with this Indian family,
and can give me their history.”

“As far as is proper for me to tell, as well as anybody, perhaps.
When I was a young man, I at times used to live with
the chief, who always made me welcome to his lodge, and gave
me his confidence. He was then but little past his prime, and
one of the smartest men, every way, I ever knew. He was then

worth property, and lived with his first wife, this girl's mother,
who, as I told you, was very good-looking and intelligent. But
his second wife was as homely as his first was handsome. As to
Wenongonet himself, who has now got to be, though still active,
an old man, he claims to have been a direct descendant of
Paugus, — a grandson, I believe, of that noted chief, — who was
slain in Lovewell's bloody fight, and whose tribe, once known
as the Sokokis or Saco Indians, who were great fighters, it is
said, were then forever broken up, the most of them fleeing
over the British highlands and joining the St. Francis Indians
in Canada. The family of Paugus, however, with a few of the
head men, who survived the battle, concluded to remain this
side of the mountain, and try to keep up a show of the tribe on
these lakes, where they lived till Paugus' son, who on the death
of his father became their sagamore or chief, died, when they
gradually drew off into Canada, leaving Wenongonet, the last
chief's son, the only permanent Indian resident, after a while,
on these lakes. But come, young man, enough of Indian matters
for to-day: we must now be stirring, or our day's work
may come short. Help me to take my canoe up here into the
lake; and, within four hours, the time to which I will limit my
absence, we will see what can be done by each, in our different
undertakings.”

The employment of another half-hour fully sufficed to place
the canoe of the hunter in the smooth water above the rapids;
when the latter, with a cheery “heigh ho,” at each light dip of his
springy oar, struck off towards the foot of the pine-covered hills
that lift their green summits from the western shores of the
lake, leaving his young companion to proceed to his allotted
portion of the sports or labors of the day. Preparing his long
fishing-rod and tackle, according to the instructions which the
hunter had given him for adapting his mode of fishing to the
locality and season, Claud made his way along down the edge
of the stream to a designated point, a short distance above the
place where, on the occurrence of the incident before described,

they had ceased to ascend the rapids in their canoes. He here
found, as he had been told, below a traversing reach of bare
breakers, a large, deep eddy of gently revolving water, in the
centre of which lay tossing on the swell a broad spiral wreath
of spotless foam. The hunter, in selecting these rapids, and especially
this resting-spot of the ascending fish, as the place
where he could safely warrant the taking of the needed supply
of trout, had not spoken without knowledge; for it may well be
doubted whether there could be found, in all the regions of the
north, a reach of running water of equal length with this wild
and singularly picturesque portion of the Androscoggin river,
containing such quantities of this beautiful fish as are found
about midsummer, swarming up the rapids on their way from
the Umbagog to the upper lakes.

So, at least, Claud then found it; for, having passed to the
most outward point of rocks inclosing the eddy, he no sooner
threw in and drew his skip bait round the borders of the foam-island
just named, than a dozen large trout shot up from beneath,
and leaped splashing along the surface, in keen rivalry
for the prize of the bait. With a second throw, he securely
hooked one of a size which required all his strength to draw it,
as he at length did, flapping and floundering to a safe landing.
And for the next three hours he pursued the sport with a success
which, notwithstanding the great number that broke away
from his hook, well made good the augury of his beginning. By
that time he had caught some dozens, of sizes varying from one
to seven pounds, and enough, and more than he needed. But
still he could not forego his exciting employment, and, insensible
of the lapse of time, continued his drafts on the seemingly
inexhaustible eddy, till roused by the long, shrill halloo of
the returned hunter, summoning him to the landing above.
Throwing down his pole by the side of his proud display of fish,
he hastened up to the lake, where he found the hunter complacently
employed in removing, for lightness of carriage, the
head and offal of a noble fat buck; when the two, with mutual

congratulations on their success, took up the canoe, and, with a
stop only long enough to take in the trout, carried and launched
their richly-freighted craft at a convenient place in the stream
below. Seeing Claud securely seated in the bottom of the canoe,
and the freight nicely balanced, the hunter took his paddle, instead
of setting-pole, the better to restrain the speed of the boat
at the most rapid and dangerous passes, and struck out into the
current, adown which, under the quick and skilful strokes of its
experienced oarsman, it was borne with almost the swiftness of
a bird on the wing, till it reached the quiet waters of the pond;
and, this being soon passed over, they entered and descended
the next reach of rapids with equal speed and safety. All
the dangers and difficulties were now over; and, leisurely rowing
homeward, they were, by sunset, at the cottage of the
Elwoods, displaying the fruits of their enterprise, and recounting
their singular adventures to the surprised and gratified inmates.