280 AUDUBON 



HOSPITALITY IN THE WOODS 



Hospitality is a virtue the exercise of which, although 

 always agreeable to the stranger, is not always duly 

 appreciated. The traveller who has acquired celebrity 

 is not unfrequently received with a species of hospi- 

 tality which is much alloyed by the obvious attention 

 of the host to his own interest ; and the favor con- 

 ferred upon the stranger must have less weight when it 

 comes mingled with almost interminable questions as to 

 his perilous adventures. Another receives hospitality at 

 the hands of persons who, possessed of all the comforts of 

 life, receive the way-worn wanderer with pomposity, lead 

 him from one part, of their spacious mansion to another, 

 and bidding him good-night, leave him to amuse himself 

 in his solitary apartment, because he is thought unfit to 

 be presented to a party of friends. A third stumbles on 

 a congenial spirit, who receives him with open arms, offers 

 him servants, horses, perhaps even his purse, to enable 

 him to pursue his journey, and parts from him with regret. 

 In all these cases the traveller feels more or less under 

 obligation, and is accordingly grateful. But, kind reader, 

 the hospitality received from the inhabitant of the forestj 

 who can offer only the shelter of his humble roof and 

 the refreshment of his homely fare, remains more deeply 

 impressed on the memory of the bewildered traveller 

 than any other. This kind of hospitality I have myself 

 frequently experienced in our woods, and now proceed 

 to relate an instance of it. 



I had walked several hundred miles, accompanied by my 

 son, then a stripling, and, coming upon a clear stream, 

 observed a house on the opposite shore. We crossed in a 

 canoe, and finding that we had arrived at a tavern, deter- 

 mined upon spending the night there. As we were both 

 greatly fatigued, I made an arrangement with our host to be 



