CRUST AND LAKE HUNTING. 527 



in the world, and the old buck tossed his antlered head, as 

 proudly as if he were sole monarch of these wilds. They 

 were in view, feeding and sporting along the water of the 

 edge for a full half hour. 



It would have been a lesson for those " budge doctors of 

 the stoic fur," of whom my friend Piscator is an emulous 

 disciple, to have witnessed the elate and eager longing of 

 the smile which radiated from his face while he gazed upofc 

 this tranquil scene. His double-barrel quivered in his grasp 

 with the excitement, and his round, red lips looked watery. 

 With such a sight before us, you may rest assured there was 

 no time lost in dispatching our " bite" of a dinner, prepara- 

 tory for work. The boat was now quickly launched, and 

 the moment it touched the water, loud and unearthly cries, 

 deafening and sonorous, rose from every part of the lake. 

 I looked around in astonishment, and the eyes of Piscator 

 sought mine with something of a wild flaring in them, but 

 the guides smiled. 



" Them's the loons !" said George. 



Two or three of them now swam out from the point of the 

 nearest island, and curiously approached us. I saw at once 

 that it was the loon, or northern diver; one of the most 

 beautifully marked of all the water-fowl. They properly 

 resented our intrusion upon their lovely and secluded breed- 

 ing-places, of which they evidently had not been conscious 

 until the splash of launching our boat upon their favorite 

 element conveyed to them, through some mysterious medium 

 of sympathy, the warning of our dangerous approaches. 

 Their cry is strangely human, and yet inhuman ; too, and 

 there is a wild and mournful quaver in it, such as I have 

 always observed to be peculiar to birds which frequent 

 desolate and solitary places. There is a strange and harmo- 

 nious fitness in this which never struck me so forcibly at 

 any other time, as during our stay at this lonely place. 



Louden, the "yaller-day" man, who was to put out the 



