WARWICK WOODLANDS. 73 



So without more ado, we got into our boats, disposed 

 our guns, with the stocks towards us in the bows, laid in 

 our stock of tinder, pipes, and liquor, and rowed off 

 merrily to our appointed stations. 



Never, in the whole course of my life, has it been my 

 fortune to look upon more lovely scenery than I beheld 

 that morning. The long narrow winding lake, lying as 

 pure as crystal beneath the liquid skies, reflecting, with 

 the correctness of the most perfect mirror, the abrupt and 

 broken hills, which sank down so precipitously into it — 

 clad as they were in foliage of every gorgeous dye, with 

 which the autumn of America loves to enhance the beauty 

 of her forest pictures — that, could they find their way into 

 its mountain-girdled basin, ships of large burthen might 

 lie afloat within a stone's throw of the shore — the slopes 

 of the wood-covered knolls, here brown, or golden, and 

 interspersed with the rich crimson of the faded maples, 

 there verdant with the evergreen leaves of the pine and 

 cedar — and the far azure summits of the most distant 

 peaks, all steeped in the serene and glowing sunshine of 

 an October morning. 



For hours we lay there, our little vessel floating as the 

 occasional breath of a sudden breeze, curling the lake into 

 sparkling wavelets, chose to direct our course, smoking 

 our cigars, and chatting cozily, and now and then pulling 

 up a great broad-backed yellow bass, whose flapping would 

 for a time disturb the peaceful silence, which reigned over 

 wood, and dale, and water, quite unbroken save by the 

 chance clamor of a passing crow : yet not a sound betoken- 

 ing the approach of our drivers had reached our ears. 



Suddenly, when the sun had long passed his meridian 

 height, and was declining rapidly toward the horizon, the 

 full round shot of a musket rang from the mountain top, 

 followed immediately by a sharp yell, and in an instant 

 the whole basin of the lake was filled with the harmonious 

 discord of the hounds. 



I could distinguish on the moment the clear sharp chal- 

 lenge of Harry's high-bred foxhounds, the deep bass voices 

 of the Southern dogs, and the untamable and cur-like 

 yelping of the dogs which the Teachmans had taken with 

 them. 



Ten minutes passed full of anxiety, almost of fear. 



We knew not as yet whither to turn our boats' head, for 



