SWIMMERS 



had been hollowed out by the water, perhaps a 

 foot high and twenty or thirty feet wide at the 

 entrance, and extending back indefinitely into the 

 gloom. 



As I stood there in the margin of the stream 

 examining the tracks, I was startled by a low but 

 very distinct growling not wholly unlike that of 

 a cat with a mouse, though deeper. It issued 

 from the cave above my head, not ten feet away, 

 and continued for several minutes ; but whether 

 the creature was growling at me or at one of its 

 own kind, or over its dinner, I was unable to 

 determine. 



The following summer I was fishing with two 

 companions along the fresh water reaches of the 

 same stream, when something entered the water 

 not far from us, with a noise exactly like that 

 made by a good-sized dog plunging after a stick ; 

 but, though only a few rods away, the foliage was 

 so dense that none of us was able to catch so 

 much as a glimpse of the creature that made it, 

 10 145 



