268 THE ADIRONDACK. 



take up an enormous quantity at every dip, and in a 

 few moments every pea had vanished. The whole 

 operation had been carried on with the sobriety with 

 which he would have reduced an equation, while the 

 hunter and student looked inquiringly at each other, 

 yet without venturing a word of expostulation against 

 the strange proceeding. When the last pea disap- 

 peared, he looked up as much as to say, " Is there any- 

 thing more to eat, gentlemen?" This was carrying 

 out the joke so capitally that the two conspirators 

 were compelled to laugh. The old hunter, as he 

 licked his empty spoon, confessed that for once he had 

 been outwitted. 



The other day I took a heavy boot to a shoemaker, 

 or rather mender^ to be repaired before I set forth on a 

 new expedition, of whom I was told a capital anec- 

 dote. An English emigrant had settled down, in a 

 remote part of the forest, where he cleared a little 

 space about him and built a log hut. He had been 

 there but a year or two, when one day as he was 

 absent in the woods with his eldest daughter, his hut 

 took fire and burned down. His wife was sick, but 

 she managed to crawl out, taking the straw bed on 

 which she lay with her. At evening the husband 



