
Tal, 0 abe. Talat sd Baral i ee 
DR. J. C. FRENCH. 
“Dose Merican feller hee’s jomp round 
very mooch, all tam laugh ha, ha! Som tam 
I tink he goin’ fight. Jaw plentee; den one 
of it say sam ting and bote of it laugh 
lowed ha. hal Dati mek me feel pooty 
plenty an I laugh ha, ha! meself.” 
That’s the way John told it, so we called 
(fee naMiatihipyweaVWwhen I came up) from 
the South last spring, there was not much 
ha, ha, in the face of the man who camped 
with me on the Platte river years ago. He 
was not the same brown-faced fellow who 
shot geese so fast in North Dakota that 
he got rattled and could not find them all. 
That white-eared, sallow chap could not 
have been the one who ate the dough 
gods and fried squeal I cooked for him 
with his plover, down in Nova Scotia; nor 
the same who ate the black bass at our 
camp down in Maine, and who said “they 
were all good, better than he could buy at 
any ‘tavern’ he ever seed.” 
He weighs 135 and I 200, and so I told 
him I'd lick him if he did not pack and 
start for Canada on the first train. 
He smoked his briar root. hard and 
drawled out: 
“Well, I'll hev ter go yer oncet more.” 
So we landed on American island, Lake 
Edward, and fished a little first, and fixed 
camp till John opened his big blue eyes 
with wonder and muttered under his 
breath: 
“Plentee Yankee trick, Bon Voyageu- 
Ensyon Cleotlessmunat:s mit) 
We like things our way, in camp, and 
pulling out fish in great strings, to brag 
about later, is not our way. Everything 
we do must have the proper “twang”’ to it, 
even if we do it by degrees, as the man 
swallowed the thermometer. 
The second day it rained. I was fixing 
a fir tree, peeled and cut just right for a 
coat and hat rack. Pard was whittling a 
spoon. He stopped, looked long and 
fixedly. 
“Say, old man, what’s that over there? 
No loon, or duck either.” 
A glance through the glass and I shout- 
ed, “Caribou, coming this way. Get your 
camera, quick!” John danced and jumped, 
wringing his hands in wild excitement, 
and crying: 
“Caribou, I go! Caribou, I go!” 
27 
“Yes, you fool, get that boat off quicker 
than you ever did any thing in your life!” 
A wild scramble, a quick, hard pull, and 
we were down on the caribou before he 
knew we were anywhere near him. At 
first he raised high up and looked, and then 
churned the water into foam as he turned 
for shore. Away shot the boat. I called 
the distance foot by foot. “Click! Once 
NOS, TO Ine Ceram, IPs, leva! — Iexeuth 
hard! Click! Ha, ha, ha!” We had got- 
ten a photo of a live wild caribou, not Io 
feet away, and just to show what he could 
do John turned him twice more. We were 
so close I could have touched him with my 
andi Leeann edadiealy tition pinata » bis 
pistol behind me when J found it in my 
hand; the Lord only knows how. John ~ 
said: “‘De dev whisper, keel him and pay 
fine. Never have it no such chance agin.” 
But I think the dev. was John himself. 
“Will it rain all day, John?” I asked, in 
the grey morning, when I heard the steady 
drip, drip on the canvass. 
“Lf tink “so, probbee: Dat loon bees 
raise hal all night. I tink he laugh ha, 
ha! some tam heemself.”’ 
But it did let up, and away we went and 
not only caught a fine string, but I also 
tore out the side of the jaw of a 4-pounder, 
and Pard caught him a few minutes later, 
broken jaw and all. We found the nest 
of that mocking, laughing loon, and in to 
days we had some wonderful things in our 
collection. Though I have been long in 
camp, and many times have seen the loon 
I never before saw his nest or eggs. Nor 
have I ever found anyone else who had 
Seen tema) John saids Dat feller he 
ain’t laugh quat so mooch dis tam as we.” 
So we marked the picture, “He laughs 
best who laughs last.” The nest was on 
an island, and of itself as near nothing as 
could well be. Just a little drift, pine straw, 
moss etc., and so near the water the spray 
must fly over it whenever the wind blew. 
The gull will lay more eggs in the same 
nest if you rob it, but the loon quits hers, 
at once, if you touch it. And a fresh gull 
egg is the best egg to eat I ever tasted. 

The photos referred to came with the 
story, but while exceedingly interesting 
were not sharp enough to reproduce.— 
EDITor. 
