THE FOEEST. 6& 



served their skins. After this adventure I saw another 

 of these pretty little animals, but contented myself with 

 observing as much of his actions to escape me as I could, 

 and left him to enjoy his life till he met with some more 

 bloodthirsty " hunter." 



There being really no game in this portion of the country 

 there never is in America in the immediate vicinity of a 

 populous place, unless a large river, or some other obstacle, 

 cuts across the path of the Sabbath-breaker and thwarts his 

 shooting propensities, Sunday being the day when all are 

 idle and hardly any at church I gave myself up to the 

 contemplation of the quiet scenery during the splendid and 

 airless afternoon which followed, and amused myself with 

 thinking that perhaps the old bear and her two cubs, which 

 had been killed in those forests but a few days prior to my 

 arrival, might perhaps have been on the spot where I was. 

 How wild, hushed, and strangely beautiful those primeval 

 forests were, and what an air of grandeur, as well as 

 desolation, that sylvan scene afforded ! Strewn upon the 

 ground lay those large trees that had once been mighty 

 rnonarchs of the forest, not even honoured in their decay 

 by the passing notice of the poorest of the adjacent settlers 

 seeking fuel. At intervals, the same class of dead kings 

 of former verdure, victims of some Indian fire, who had 

 not yet fallen from decay, or been torn up or stricken 

 down by tempests of wind or lightning, so prevalent in 

 America, stretched their bleached arms above the sur 

 rounding verdure, as if seeking annihilation by the same 

 element from heaven which man in design or wantonness 

 had blasted them with on earth ; pale, bare, and glitter 

 ing in their ghastly hue, they offered a strong and start 

 ling contrast to the invisible green beneath them, deepen 

 ing into shade by the decline of the setting sun, which 



