NARRATIVES. 



[In the first three of the following articles illustrating the trapper's life, 

 we introduce to our readers the Hutchins family, the father and two sons 

 a trio of " mighty hunters." EDITORS.] 



AN EVENING WITH AN OLD TRAPPER. 



BY W. A. HINDS. 



OF all story-tellers, give me those who have spent the 

 greater portion of their lives in hunting, fishing, and trapping ; 

 who have lived for weeks on wild game ; who have tramped 

 for months alone through the forests ; who have camped on 

 green boughs, or kept themselves comfortable in deer-skins, 

 when the thermometer was far below zero. Such men inspire 

 me with a degree of respect like that entertained for all whose 

 lives have been heroic. Soldiers of the woods, they have 

 often endured hardships superior to those who have carried 

 the knapsack in the open field. Though in many instances 

 unfamiliar with books, they yet have a power of graphic and 

 forcible description, seldom possessed by those who have made 

 language their study. After conversing with them an hour, 

 one feels as though he had himself encountered the bear and 

 the panther, and been successful in hunting the otter and 

 mink. 



It would be difficult to find, at least in the Eastern and 

 Middle States, a better representative of this class than Mr. 

 John Hutchins, now a resident of Manlius, N. Y. 



Born in Portland, Somerset County, Maine, November 16, 

 1801, he is consequently now (1865) nearly sixty-four years 

 of age ; but he is still " eager for the chase," and is plan- 

 ning a trapping expedition into Canada for the coming au- 



