THE BOY-HUNTER. 47 
of my traps; of white foxes and black foxes, or of a great 
opossum, lying with crushed heads beneath my dead-falls; or 
of tracking some creature that left the foot-mark of an ele- 
phant on the fresh snow for miles and miles through the bowed 
and foreign-looking woods, until I had tree’d it at last; when, 
after toiling and tugging, with sweaty brows, I had drawn it 
forth from the hollow, and held it in my hand, I saw, without 
the least surprise, that it was a soft little wood-mouse! Ah! 
delicious fantasies were they ! 
When at cock-crow I bounded out of bed and ran to the 
window, the first thing—how I clapped my hands and danced 
for joy, and waked every body with my shoutings—“ The 
snow! the snow! a deep snow!” 
Then what a fussing time!—making new traps, stealing 
clap-boards, and every other kind of boards that were avail- 
able, to be split into trap pieces! What a teasing my father for 
triggers, to make me triggers for spring-falls, nooses, par- 
tridge traps, traps for little birds, and all! How I wondered 
I could not get the old gentleman to understand that I should 
be ruined! dead-ruined! if I did not get my traps ready to 
be set early—even by breakfast-time—for the other boys 
would be setting their’s, too, and take all the best places. 
Little did I care for the hot coffee and cakes that morning, 
but snatching a sup and a bite, was off, whistling for Milo, 
and shouting for Pomp the negro boy, to accompany and help 
me. LEagerly did we discuss, by the way, as we lugged our 
heavy traps through the deep snow, whether the sink-hole in 
the pasture, the thicket in the corn-field fence row, the black- 
berry patch in the corner, or on the edge of the woods, were 
the surest places for ‘Bob Whites,” (partridges), or “ Molly 
Cotton-tails,” (hares). There was no deciding between them, 
so, to settle the matter, a trap was set at each place, and one 
in addition for larks, doves, red-birds, and sparrows, by the 
old wheat-stack behind the barn. 
Pompey, who carried the spade, dug away the snow from 
