An Unexpected Treat 



Who comes here ? My doe ? 



MEBRY WIVES. 



ON one of our evenings in the wilderness we had a 

 quiet spell for a few hours, and my guide and I started 

 out moose calling. We pushed our canoe lightly and 

 very cautiously up the inlet of the little lake on which 

 we were camped, stopping frequently to listen, while 

 we peered with expectant eyes into every bunch of 

 alders, every clump of young pines, hoping against 

 hope that we might see a moose " coming to water." 

 It was about five o'clock in the afternoon. The air 

 was still, not a breath was stirring, and the scenery 

 along the brook was clothed in beauty beyond the 

 reach of poet's pen or painter's art. Th brown and 

 green tints of the frosted and unfrosted ferns ; the 

 tufts of waving grasses with their blades tipped with 

 yellow; the alders just beginning to put on their 

 autumn brown ; the red maple, the yellow birch, the 

 dark green pines, the stately juniper, the sad cypress 

 all mirrored in the tawny stream that flowed lazily 

 beneath, without a ripple to disturb their sembled 

 beauty or a murmur to interrupt the reigning silence. 



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