LIFTIXO THE TRAPS. 213 



LIFTIITG THE TEAPS. 



Ox the northwest of the State of Maine exists a 

 ridge of hills which divide it from the township of 

 Success, ill the State of Xew Hampshire. Whatever 

 may have been the cause (possibly the presumption 

 of the uamor), it has remained as wild and unsettled, 

 as it was in the days when the whole country be- 

 longed to the aborigines. Xo, I make a mistake ; a ruin 

 of a tumble-dov/n diminutive barn, on close scrutiny, 

 may be found. The area of tliis township is composed 

 of an immense meadow (through which a clear but deep 

 and sluggish stream flows) and the pine-clad slopes 

 that divide it from the State of Maine. For some 

 weeks I had been residing eight or ten miles distant 

 from Success. Tlie person in whose house I stayed was 

 a trapper during winter, when the inhospitable climate 

 foiled any attempt at cultivating what at no season 

 was a productive soil. Night after night with pleas- 

 ure I listened to his stories of how he had run down 



