EVENING AT PAUL'S. 113 



and linen, only their brown faces revealing to you that they 

 are genuine sportsmen. 



Meanwhile, the long, broad veranda is crowded with 

 eavv chairs, and the fragrant Havana mingles its perfume 

 with the aroma of balsam and spruce and pine floating ever 

 in over the cooling waters of the St. Regis. Here is a knot 

 of respectful and credulous listeners assembled around a 

 rotund and enthusiastic Doctor of Divinity from New York, 

 who is telling fishing stories that draw heavily upon the 

 faith of his heaivrs. and of deer hunts in which he figured 

 a> the hero, out Murraving Murray. 15ut it is vastly inter 

 esting. for the learned Doctor tells a story well, and you 

 choose to believe thai he is essentially telling the honest 

 truth, as his memory sees it. 



Other knots of men are gathered all along the veranda, 

 and their talk is of the woods and lakes and streams, of 

 trout and deer. 



On the grass in front, is a jolly guide playing with a lit- 

 tle child, tossing it up, rolling it over on the turf, laughing, 

 and a- happy as a fond papa can be; and well he may be 

 happy, for he has this evening just returned with two tour- 

 ists, after eleven days' absence, during which he has made 

 the grand circuit to .John Brown's Tract by one chain of 

 lakes and streams, and returned by another. His wife and 

 a baby, and the end of his hard trip, have given him joy 

 enough tonight to make up for many a backache on tin- 

 long carries. 



At ten o'clock every body goes to bed. It is both the 

 fashion and the inclination. 



