CHAPTER XXVII. 



WOULD I WERE A BOY AGAIN. 



" WE have played the boy again, yesterday and to-day, 

 pretty well," remarked Smith, as we sat in front of our tents 

 in the evening, smoking our pipes. " And I am half in- 

 clined to think we have started for home too soon, after all. 

 Spalding's moralizing for the last two or three days deceived 

 me. I thought, as he was becoming so serious, he must be 

 getting tired of the woods ; but his proposition yesterday to 

 escort that deer to the shore, and frighten him almost to 

 death, his jolly humor with our young friends over the way, 

 and the trick he played on us in regard to the raccoon this 

 evening, satisfies me that he's got a good deal of the boy in 

 him yet. We shall have to retreat from the woods slower 

 than I thought, to exhaust it." 



" If the cares of business or the duties of life did not call 

 us back to civilization" said the Doctor, "I could almost 

 spend the summer among these lakes, only for the luxury of 

 feeling like a boy again. When I listen to the glad voices 

 of the wild things around us, I can almost wish myself .one 

 of them." 



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