A CLOSE CALL 139 



" D n it all, I am lying down ! " 



" The d 1 you are ! Then stand up and perhaps 



the buck won't see you." 



We left Chesuncook Lake at half-past one in the 

 afternoon, fixed our loads in the canoes at a landing 

 stage near the mouth of the river, and in the driving, 

 pitiless rain, we started to paddle up the stream, in- 

 tending to reach the Halfway House, about eleven 

 miles up, before dark. On the trip up the " sport " is 

 expected to leave the canoe and walk around the 

 stream's obstructions known as the Pine Stream 

 Falls, Kocky Rips and the Fox Hole Eapids, while 

 the guide, with the lightened canoe, poles it up against 

 the swift current which swirls and eddies around the 

 huge rocks lying in all sorts of ways and angles in 

 the bed of the stream. We walked therefore through 

 a path in the woods around Pine Stream Falls and 

 the Rocky Rips, and above them was a stretch of 

 dead-water which ended at the foot of Fox Hole 

 Rapids. Here we left the canoes again and took to 

 the road which runs in a nearly straight direction, 

 while the river makes a great bend off to the right, 

 and the road for the distance of, say a mile and a 

 half, cuts off quite a detour in the river. Just as we 

 entered this road I told my son to walk ahead very 

 carefully until he came to a piece of burnt land which 

 my recollection said was a feeding ground for deer, 

 and he might get a shot. As he emerged from the 



