476 WILD SCENES AND WILD HUNTERS. 
thereof was mine for the winning—mine to be struggled 
for manfully with my brother—mine to be pouched, carried 
off and eaten, if my right hand retained its cunning! Even 
my placid friend, Piscator, felt within him the movings of a 
mild exultation, as he stretched forth his hands above it in 
calm blessing, and peacefully smiled! 
Here and there the white mist-clouds lay along the hill- 
sides above them—seeming to form high up against the 
purpled green the zrial double of the lakes—and there, ng 
doubt, the swift-winged swallows—though we couldn't see 
them—dived through the fleecy waves like brook-trout, and 
the fish-hawk swooped ke the ravenous salmon—if they 
didn’t at them below! 
Of this we had much more palpable evidence, for we saw 
many of them rise, beating their wings with exulting screams 
as they went circling up and up, bearing a three to a five 
pounder in their talons. Fat pickings for fish-hawks, any 
how, in these thirty odd lakes! How I envied the rascals, 
and wished to hear :the war-cry of a bald eagle, and see 
him come down from the clouds above, hurled swiftly, like 
the bolt he once bore, upon resistless wings, to strike the 
gluttons and make them drop their struggling prey, and 
then to see the conquering robber pause and dive with a 
roar of plumes down the still air and snatch the glistening 
spoil before it reached the wave again. 
These are the quick, fierce battles of the air-kings that 
we sometimes see from such a perch! 
But let us count our riches over, and name their names 
and places that we may know them. 
Sheer down from our pinnacle on the northern side lies 
Lake Pleasant—a great white opal, with an emerald in the 
centre. This is 
The captain jewel of the carcanet,” 
and old earth wears it proudly for its beauty, and its name 
