130 WILD SPORTS IN THE SOUTH. 



sweep of restless, flattering, envious fashion, just endured, half 

 forgotten, sometimes in literary life, sometimes toiling in some 

 hard handicraft, where the gains they make are applied to those 

 they love, sometimes in the wood, or by the sea-side village. 



The friend of whom I am about to speak, and who belongs to 

 this class, is oftenest seen by lakes, or the slow-moving streams of 

 the woods. I deem it my duty, for many a lesson taught by 

 him, and hours of quiet companionship, to speak in his behalf a 

 kindly word, and save him and his family, as far as in me lies, 

 from that unmerited neglect which seems to be the fate of the 

 humble and the unobtrusive. 



The friend to whom I allude is the Muskrat. Let no one 

 smile at the name, or mock 



" The Bhort and simple annals of the poor." 



His coat may not be of as many colours as a courtier's, but it 

 covers a kindlier heart ; his house may not be of as stately propor- 

 tions as a banker's, but it shelters a more tranquil soul Writers 

 may have slighted him, schoolboys may have pelted him, poets 

 left his name unsung, and the boor may have sought to deride him 

 by naming him Musquash and other opprobrious titles ; but this 

 is not the first time in the annals of the world a similar fate has 

 overtaken modest worth. Pass by their crude opinions, and let us 

 visit my friend. 



Down by many a softly-purling brook, whose sinuosities have 

 unearthed the gnarled roots of oaks and hickories, and where the 

 school-boy hastes from tasks to find a shady nooning, the Muskrat 

 builds his nest. His selection of a home shows his cultivated 

 taste, and gives a lesson to the more unobservant rustic. By the 

 cloudy water that lies in the canals, that lead beneath the oaks, 

 you may know his retreat. There he rests, while the day is warm, 

 in the quiet enjoyment of his domestic pleasures, safe from pur- 

 suit in the winding galleries of his earthen fortress, but, 



" When the sheep are in the fauld, and the kye at hame, 

 And a' the world to sleep are gane," 



when the moonshine falls on bridge and reeds, and twinkling stars 

 are floating on the water, then this gentle friend comes forth to 



