324< IN THE OLD WEST 



with wet, and exceedingly heavy for the cattle, 

 and they scarcely advanced more than ten miles 

 a-day. 



At the camp-fire at night, Antoine, the Cana- 

 dian guide, amused them with tales of the wild life 

 and perilous adventures of the hunters and trap- 

 pers who make the mountains their home; often 

 extorting a scream from the women by the de- 

 scription of some scene of Indian fight and slaugh- 

 ter, or beguiling them of a commiserating tear 

 by the narrative of the sufferings and privations 

 endured by those hardy hunters in their arduous 

 life. 



Mary listened with the greater interest since 

 she remembered that such was the life which had 

 been led by one very dear to her — by one long 

 supposed to be dead, of whom she had never but 

 once since his departure, nearly fifteen years be- 

 fore, heard a syllable. Her imagination pictured 

 him as the bravest and most daring of these ad- 

 venturous hunters, and conjured up his figure 

 charging through the midst of whooping sav- 

 ages, or stretched on the ground perishing from 

 wounds, or cold, or famine. 



Amongst the characters who figured in An- 

 toine's stories, a hunter named La Bonte was 

 made conspicuous for deeds of hardiness and dar- 

 ing. The first mention of the name caused the 

 blood to rush to Mary's face; not that she for 

 a moment imagined it was her La Bonte, for she 



