THE MUD QUEEN 
“Flying in great flocks, like arrows 
And in long lines, waving, bending 
Like a bow-string snapped asunder 
Came the white geese, Wawa-wawa, 
From their wanderings in the Northland.” 
LONGFELLOW’S Hiawatha. 
THERE’S too much furniture in most bedrooms. My 
bedroom at the shack contained only a most comfort- 
able bed and a row of nails on the opposite wall. It was 
a most equitable arrangement. I could lie in bed and 
see all my valued and treasured possessions in shooting 
taiment, hunginarow. At home these same garments 
are banished to the attic and every spring and fall 
threats are made that the old clothes man will get them. 
It never disturbs me however because I know that no 
old clothes man would even take them for a gift. Who 
ever heard of new shooting clothes. The real things 
are always old and faded, patched and stained. Then 
and only then do they reach close to their owner’s 
heart. 
It was our good fortune to go to and from the hunting 
ground in the Mud Queen that day. The Mud Queen 
was a long narrow hunting skiff with the heart of a Ford. 
The Ford car had long since bid adieu to the world, but 
the engine still beat true. The Mud Queen hunting 
skiffs are made along the same lines but a little stronger 
and larger than the regular rowing skiffs. They are 
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