A TASTE OP MAINE BIRCH. 133 



pering and crying, and the other baby bear came tum- 

 bling down. In leaving the place, greatly puzzled as 

 to what had become of the mother bear, Uncle Nathan 

 followed another of her frozen tracks, and after about 

 a quarter of a mile saw beside it, upon the snow, the 

 fresh trail he had been in search of. In making her 

 escape the bear had stepped exactly in her old tracks 

 that were hard and icy, and had thus left no mark 

 till she took to the snow again. 



During his trapping expeditions into the woods in 

 midwinter, I was curious to know how Uncle Nathan 

 passed the nights, as we were twice pinched with the 

 cold at that season in our tent and blankets. It was 

 no trouble to keep warm, he said, in the coldest 

 weather. As night approached, he would select a 

 place for his camp on the side of a hill. With one of 

 his snow-shoes he would shovel out the snow till the 

 ground was reached, carrying the snow out in front, 

 as we scrape the earth out of the side of a hill to level 

 up a place for the house and yard. On this level place, 

 which, however, was made to incline slightly toward 

 the hill, his bed of boughs was made. On the ground 

 he had uncovered he built his fire. His bed was thus 

 on a level with the fire, and the heat could not thaw 

 the snow under him and let him down, or the burn- 

 ing logs roll upon him. With a steep ascent behind 

 it the fire burned better, and the wind was not so apt 

 to drive the smoke and blaze in upon him. Then, 

 with the long, curving branches of the spruce stuck 

 thickly around three sides of the bed, and curving 



