A BED OF BOUGHS. 177 



"Well, have it so; but I would not exchange 

 those ten or fifteen minutes with that trout for the 

 tame two hours you have spent in catching that string 

 of thirty. To see a big fish after days of small fry is 

 an event ; to have a jump from one is a glimpse of 

 the sportsman's paradise ; and to hook one and actu- 

 ally have him under your control for ten minutes, 

 why, that is the paradise itself as long as it lasts." 



One day I went down to the house of a settler a 

 mile below, and engaged the good dame to make us 

 a couple of loaves of bread, and in the evening we 

 went down after them. How elastic and exhilarating 

 the walk was through the cool, transparent shadows ! 

 The sun was gilding the mountains and its yellow 

 light seemed to be reflected through all the woods. 

 At one point we looked through and along a valley 

 of deep shadow upon a broad sweep of mountain 

 quite near and densely clothed with woods, flooded 

 from base to summit by the setting sun. It was a 

 wild, memorable scene. What power and effective- 

 ness in Nature, I thought, and how rarely an artist 

 catches her touch ! Looking down upon or squarely 

 into a mountain covered with a heavy growth of 

 birch and maple and shone upon by the sun, is a 

 sight peculiarly agreeable to me. How closely the 

 swelling umbrageous heads of the trees fit together, 

 and how the eye revels in the flowing and easy uni- 

 formity while the mind feels the ruggedness and ter- 

 rible power beneath ! 



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