118 A TASTE OF MAINE BIRCH. 



even if he has a stone for a pillow. The earth must 

 open its arms a little for us even in life, if we are to 

 sleep well upon is bosom. I have often heard my 

 grandfather, who was a soldier of the Revolution, tell 

 with great gusto how he once bivouacked in a little 

 hollow made by the overturning of a tree, and slept 

 so soundly that he did not wake up till his cradle 

 was half full of water from a passing shower. 



What bird or other creature might represent the 

 divinity of Pleasant Pond I do not know, but its 

 demon, as of most northern inland waters, is the loon ; 

 and a very good demon he is too, suggesting some- 

 thing not so much malevolent, as arch, sardonic, ubiq- 

 uitous, circumventing, with just a tinge of something 

 inhuman and uncanny. His fiery red eyes gleaming 

 forth from that jet-black head are full of meaning. 

 Then, his strange horse laughter by day and his weird, 

 doleful cry at night, like that of a lost and wandering 

 spirit, recall no other bird or beast. He suggests some- 

 thing almost supernatural in his alertness and amaz- 

 ing quickness, cheating the shot and the bullet of the 

 sportsman out of their aim. I know of but one other 

 bird so quick, and that is the humming-bird, which I 

 have never been able to kill with a gun. The loon 

 laughs the shot-gun to scorn, and the obliging young 

 farmer above referred to told me he had shot at them 

 hundreds of times with his rifle, without effect, 

 they always dodged his bullet. We had in our party 

 a breech-loading rifle, which weapon is perhaps an 

 appreciable moment of time quicker than the ordinary 



