JoE AND Crontr. 109 


a description of the bird, and how he is acting at the time 
of giving such sounds; that he raises his head as he sounds 
the Ah! Ah! then thrusts it well out and downward, 
as if to stab a frog with his long sharp bill, as he makes the 
sounds ‘¢k chunk.” Joe quietly informs Cronie, as near as he 
can make out by his mumbling words, —for both his fat cheeks 
are well rounded out with broiled trout and JAZansur’s 
Boston butter crackers, that he has seen them often down in 
his grandpa’s meadow, beyond the old meadow hay barn. 
Dinner over, they resume their cruise along the shores. 
Passing slowly, close in under the trees, they see a pair of 
porcupines trot or rather waddle along on the bank, one close 
behind the other, looking as usual so very comical, they must 
again laugh at them, at which they look not their way at all, 
nor pay the least attention to them whatever, but roll and 
wag along on their short, fat legs, supporting their short, 
round, puffed-out bodies, their thick, quilly tails sticking quite 
straight out behind, the quills upon them and upon their 
backs all pointed upward. Small heads and little, black eyes 
that were looking only straight ahead, for they were minding 
their own business, and trotted back along the shore by 
which the boat had just passed, and so near they could have 
been reached with a fishing pole, and when first sighted they 
were taken for little cub bears. Even in the deep wildwood, 
among the animals, we discover human traits, for from the 
porcupine we learn that man is not the only animal that may 
become so deeply infatuated as to be oblivious to all else but 
his courtship. 
After noting the quill pig promenade and wishing them 
much joy on their wedding tour, they step on shore and find 
a cool spring, for which they are always thankful, as a 

