456 WILD SCENES AND WILD HUNTERS. 



a little stream wMch empties into the larger, I turned into it 

 to explore its course. Fir and hemlock of a century's growth 

 met overhead, and formed an archway radiant with frost- 

 work. All was dark within ; but I was young and fearless, 

 and, as I peered into an unbroken forest, that reared itself 

 on the borders of the stream, I laughed with very joyous- 

 ness ; my wild hurrah rang through the silent woods, and I 

 stood listening to the echo that reverberated again and again, 

 until all was hushed. Suddenly a sound arose — it seemed to 

 me to come from beneath the ice ; it sounded low and tremu- 

 lous at first, until it ended in one wild yell. I was appalled. 

 Never before had such a noise met my ears. I thought it 

 more than mortal; so fierce, and amidst such an unbroken 

 solitude, it seemed as though a fiend had blown a blast from 

 an infernal trumpet. Presently I heard the twigs on shore 

 crack as though from the tread of some brute animal, and 

 the blood rushed back to my forehead with a bound that 

 made my skin burn, and I felt relieved that I had to contend 

 with things earthly, and not of spiritual nature — my energies 

 returned, and I looked around me for some means of escape. 



The moon shone through the opening at the mouth of the 

 creek by which I had entered the forest, and considering this 

 the best means of escape, I darted towards it like an arrow. 

 'Twas hardly a hundred yards distant, and the swallow could 

 scarcely excel my desperate flight ; yet, as I turned my head 

 to the shore, I could see two dark objects dashing through 

 the underbrush at a pace nearly double in speed to my own. 

 By this great speed, and the short yells which they 

 occasionally gave, I knew at once that these were the much 

 dreaded gray wolves. 



I had never met with these animals, but from the descrip- 

 tion given of them, I had but little pleasure in making their 

 acquaintance. Their untameable fierceness, and the untiring 

 strength which seems part of their nature, render them 

 objects of dread to every benighted traveller. 



