CRUST AND LAKE HUNTING. 527 
in the world, and the old buck tossed his antlered head, as 
proudly as if he were sole monarch of these wilds. They 
were in view, feeding and sporting along the water of the 
‘edge for a full half hour. 
It would have been a lesson for those “budge doctors of 
the stoic fur,” of whom my friend Piscator is an emulous 
‘disciple, to have witnessed the elate and eager longing of 
the smile which radiated from his face while he gazed upon 
this tranquil scene. His double-barrel quivered in his grasp 
with the excitement, and his round, red lips looked watery. 
With such a sight before us, you may rest assured there was 
no time lost in dispatching our “bite” of a dinner, prepara- 
tory for work. The boat was now quickly launched, and 
the moment it touched the water, loud and unearthly cries, 
deafening and sonorous, rose from every part of the lake. 
I looked around in astonishment, and the eyes of Piscator 
sought mine with something of a wild flaring in them, but 
the guides smiled. 
“‘Them’s the loons!” said George. 
Two or three of them now swam out from the point of the 
nearest island, and curiously approached us. I saw at once 
that it was the loon, or northern diver; one of the most 
beautifully marked of all the water-fowl. They properly 
resented our intrusion upon their lovely and secluded breed- 
ing-places, of which they evidently had not been conscious 
until the splash of launching our boat upon their favorite 
element conveyed to them, through some mysterious medium 
of sympathy, the warning of our dangerous approaches. 
Their cry is strangely human, and yet inhuman; too, and 
there is a wild and mournful quaver in it, such as I have 
always observed to be peculiar to birds which frequent 
desolate and solitary places. There is a strange and harmo- 
nious fitness in this which never struck me so forcibly at 
any other time, as during our stay at this lonely place. 
Lotden, the “yaller-day” man, who was to put out the 
