CHAPTER XVI. 



We had all the the eiijo3'meiit that a life in camp on the 

 shores of a beautiful lake gives, day after day, ]jut nothing 

 occurred very notable to record. The evening camp-fire 

 nightly brought us all together, and there was "fun alive!" 

 It was a favorite pastime of the Editor's, as bed-time ap- 

 proached, to relate "hair-lifting" stories of panthers and 

 other wild animals that arc supposed to lurk in the forest, 

 but which no summer visitor ever sees. On one evening in 

 particular he exerted his fancy to the utmost, but with sucli 

 a truthful air that even the very elect would have been de- 

 ceived, if they had not known the editorial capabilities in 

 the way of invention. The forest seemed alive with tragedies 

 ready to burst upon us from the black depths around. 

 None of us would have been surprised if a pack of wolves 

 had dashed down ui)on us across the clearing. A panther's 

 scream in the darkness of the adjacent wilderness would 

 have been as natural to the occasion as the darting flight of 

 the cross-bills at sunrise. As we crawled into camp and 

 went to bed, one, whose fortune it was to sleep at the end 

 of the roAv, near the entrance over which hung a piece of 

 bagging, displayed an unusual nervousness. Such is the 

 inhumanity of man to man, that the rest also became very 

 nervous, and expressed fears that as the fire biu'ned low we 

 might be attacked by some wild beast. 



