48 
age, with pale face and loosened hair, and rushing up to 
where I stood, with manifestly no sense of any impro- 
priety whatever, laid her hand on my shoulder, and while 
her glorious black eyes shone through the mist of gather- 
ing tears deep down into my own, in the purest English 
panted out: "Where is my grandfather? Is he dead?" 
The not unpleasant task of quieting her fears and re- 
assuring her concerning the safety of her grandfather now 
became my own, and proved a more acceptable one than 
had that of the hard pull in the canoe back to town. 
The only mischief was it proved all too brief, for, catch- 
ing the word that the old man had just been borne up the 
hill by the other path, she turned from me, and with the 
grace — and almost the speed — of a frightened fawn, sped 
up the hillside, her long, black hair flying in a cloud 
around her shapely shoulders, and vanished among the 
trees; and the voice of my father calling the dazed and 
stunned boy back to earth again with the peremptory 
words, "Come, come! Gather up those things and get 
into the boat here !" sounded harsh beyond all need. 
While the chronicler of this ancient history has never 
felt free to contend for anything beyond a partial recovery 
from this trying experience, on the part of the crazy boy, 
he is pleased to record the fact that the recovery to health 
and strength on the part of the old turtle hunter was 
complete and rapid. 
When again able to converse with his friends, he ex- 
plained to them that the sudden squall of wind had over- 
taken his little craft just as the first dread touch of the 
coming epileptic fit was felt, and both together just as 
he reached the narrow pass between the islands. 
Beyond this he recollected nothing distinctly. 
It was evident, however, that whether his canoe was 
overturned at the edge of the mangrove roots, or whether 
he swam to them, his last conscious act had been to seize 
a root at the water's edge, and as this was under the lee of 
one end of the island, the waves had not rolled over his 
head. 
As soon as he was able to walk, though still weak and 
unsteady, he paid my father a visit, to express his thanks 
to the friendly stranger. His gratitude was pathetic. In 
badly broken English he tried to free the burden of his 
heart; and, thinking it might interest my father to know 
that he had been a soldier who had served with the 
"Washington of South America," the old man drew up 
his bent form, and with the dignity of a soldier, and some- 
thing of the grace of the old Castilian, announced : "Me 
Columbia man! Ale fight with Bolivar!"— all of which we 
ascertained to be literally true. 
This last dangerous adventure, from which he had so 
narrowly escaped, ended the hunting career of the old 
Spaniard; and my father took care to add his own solemn 
remonstrance to the protestations of relatives against any 
further useless exposure of the old man's life. 
Orin Bfxknap. 
Pioneer Days.— VIL 
BY ROWLAND E. ROBINSON. 
JosiAH disposed of his betterments to Delaplaine on the 
terms proposed, and sold his oxen and all his belongings 
but gun and traps. The two pioneers drifted out into the 
wilderness, homeless, yet at home wherever they chanced 
to be, now hunters and trappers, now attaching them- 
selves to the Green Mountain Boys in their raids upon the 
Yorkers, the most daring and reckless of their number, 
though without the cause and object of the permanent 
settlers, but through the love of adventure. Now drifting 
apart they, lost sight of each other for months at a time. 
Josiah was still tarrying, toward the middle of spring, at 
a settler's some miles above the lower falls of Great Otter, 
after spending the winter between working enough to pay 
his board and trapping on his own account. He was hesi- 
tating between hiring out to the settler for the season and 
going down to the old colonies to take part in the events 
which were stirring the forming nation from its heart to 
its remotest extremities. It was not exalted patriotism 
that urged him to this, but what is so often mistaken 
for it, a desire for action and love for adventure, that 
the monotony of tilling virgin soil and every-day warfare 
with the giants of the forest could not satisfy. 
He was impelled to leave the place by another and quite 
different motive. Charity Benham, the only daughter of 
the house of marriageable age, was impressed with the 
belief that her father ought to have a son-in-law, and to 
her mind there was no one whom she had seen who was 
so well fitted to fill the place as this sturdy young pioneer, 
but he seemed little inclined to mating. Yet Charity was 
tall, dark-eyed, dark-haired, good-tempered, and in all re- 
spects save in being a notable housewife so exactly the 
opposite to faithless Chloe that Josiah 's pulses quickened 
when she cooed around him, that warned him that he 
might forget his forswearing of all womankind. 
If he resisted her blandishments, which it was plain to 
see her father and mother favored, it would be very em- 
barrassing, and could only end in incurring the ill will of 
all. But he was tired of wandering, and longed to rest 
awhile in this comfortable harbor. Thus he was inwardly 
debating near noon one day in May as he cut firewood at 
the door; and John Benham and his son, Sam, just 
come in from the field, sat on a log idly watching his 
sturdy strokes, while all waited the serving of dinner. 
An appetizing smell of boiled pork and greens came out 
of the open door, wherein Charity presently appeared and 
bid them to the board. 
"An' I got tu tell ye, Mr. Hill," she said, casting an 
admiring glance upon Josiah, "you be the cutest hand to 
gather caow-slops! Why, the' wa'n't nothin' but clear 
leaves, an' 't wa'n't nothin' tu pick 'em over !" 
"That's the sort o' man for ye tu git, Cherry !" cried her 
father, bestowing an impartial wink upon the two, under 
which they blushed hotly. "You want tu jest freeze tu 
him, gal !" 
"Why, Pop, hain't you 'shamed ! Who on airth " 
She suddenlv checked her simpering to stare out upon the 
road, whither the eyes of the others followed hers, and 
saw a strong, lithe man approaching at a brisk swinging 
pacfe. 
"Why, it is Major Beach, from Rutland way !" Benham 
exclaimed, going out to meet the traveler. "Haow be ye. 
Major? You're jest in time for pot luck with us. Come 
right in." 
"Not much time for me to eat or talk." said the other. 
Then lowerin'g his voice, "Who is the tall chap you've got 
here? All right?" 
"Josier Hul, ol' Dalrymple's pardner. Yes, he's true 
blue. What's the' up ? Yorkers cuttin' up ag'in ?" 
"No; its* r'yal game this time. Nothin' less 'n the 
British lion in ol' Ti'. Ethan Allen takes the job. We 
meet tu the cove a mild north o' Ti', to-morrow arter- 
noon." 
John Benham's face grew very sober as he repeated the 
words, as if scarcely sure he heard aright. "Take Ti' ! 
To-morrer night? That's mighty suddent, an' a ticklish 
job!" 
"Why, I thought you was ready at a minute's notice! 
They've got you on the roll here," said Beach, running 
over a paper which he took from the pocket of the coat 
that hung on his arm. "But if you don't want to re.bk- 
it, you'd better stay tu hum wi' the women folks," he 
added, with some scorn. Then turning to Josiah, from 
whom he had taken no pains to keep the secret after Ben- 
ham's assurance, "How is it with you, my man? Are you 
ready for a whack at ol' Ti' imder Ethan Allen, along wi' 
over ten hundred good men?" 
"Yes, I be, an' '11 start wi' you naow," Josiah an- 
swered promptly. 
"Why, sartinly, I cal'late tu go," Benham said in con- 
fusion, "but it come kinder suddent. Sartinly I'll go, an' 
so '11 Sam." 
"All right," cried Beach, heartily. "An' naow gi' me 
that dinner quick, for I've got to pull foot lively." 
He swallowed his dinner so hastily that there was little 
nevvs to be got out of him, and then was away again, to 
the disgust of the mother and Charity, who thought him a 
most unsocial guest, not worth entertaining for what 
he gave in return. But to make sixty miles on foot that 
day left little time for taUcing. 
A grand wolf hunt, a "surround" of a pack which had 
just been located, was the pretext given to the women 
for this grand turnout of armed men, and the good souls 
cheerfully spent the afternoon in cooking for the hunters. 
Next morning these men set fortli, Benham and his 
son armed with their long smoothbores, those handy 
guns which served equally well as fowling pieces or 
weapons of war; and Josiah with his favorite rifle, which 
he held to be the only proper arm for a man, and each 
carrying a blanket and two days' rations. Charity needs 
must have a tearful parting with Josiah, from which he 
withdrew with unlover-like haste, and was out upon the 
road before his companions. 
"If ever 3'ou git him, youTl hafter du all the sparkin'," 
said Hannah Benham, "for he's the Chicken-heartedest 
grown-up man ever I see." 
"He hain't nuther !" Charity cried, resentfully. "He's 
as brave as a lion, an' I know the ugly creetur's '11 kill him 
as likely as not. Oh, dear !" and she gazed long after his 
tall figure, blurred and misty through tear-dimmed ej^es. 
The three volunteers trudged on at a brisk pace over the 
wretched roads, until they came to the better thorough- 
fare of Amherst's military road, from Number Four to 
the Clamplain forts. Now and then they fell in with other 
armed men, singly and in squads, all bent on the same 
errand, 
"Hello!" hailed one. "You goin' vvolf-huntin' tew? 
Wal, they du say it's a lion arter all, an' like 'nough tu 
scratch an' bite if his tail is trod on." 
A little past noon the company, gathering as it advanced, 
came to a famous camping ground where a cool, clear 
spring bubbled out by the roadside and trickled through a 
cleared space. Here they halted for rest and refresh- 
ment, where many a company of rangers and red coats 
and bands of painted Indians had made camp in the days 
of the old wars and savage forays, and left traces of their 
brief tarrying. 
Then resuming their straggling march, they ' soon 
crossed the slow, muddy course of the oddly named 
Lemon Fair, and so toward nightfall came to "the ren- 
dezvous on the bank of a small creek. As they drew near 
they saw groups of men lounging in the lights of newly 
kindled camp-fires. Moving about among . them, now 
dusky in shadow, now clearly revealed, the herculean fig- 
ure of Ethan Allen ; the no less commanding one of Seth 
Warner, and another restlessly alert, clad in a colonel's 
full uniform, which they afterward learned to be the 
brave, ambitious, unscrupulous and, later, infamous Bene- 
dict Arnold. 
The fires shone out among the tree trunks upon the 
prows of a mixed flotilla of small craft drawn up on the 
shore or now and then on an incoming boat. Allen came 
out to meet the party, and discovering them to be his 
own people, gave them most cordial welcome. 
"Ah, more of the chosen ones of Israel come up to fight 
the battles of Jehovah, and smite his enemies hip and 
thigh !" Then recognizing Josiah, "And you, tall son of 
Anak, have you come up so far out of the wilderness to do 
battle? Well done, and better if you thought to bring a 
vessel of those strong waters of Gaul," he added, smacking 
his lips at recollection of the flotsam brandy. "And your 
old, dried-up comrade — which way has the wind blown 
him?" 
"I'm sorry, Colonel," Josiah answered, shaking his 
hand, "him an' the brandy hain't nary one on 'em here 
where they're both needed. But ol' Kenelm would be, if 
he knowed." 
"Well, come in to the fires and rest ye. You've got 
your grub with you, of course, an' maybe we can scare up 
an under j awful of honest New England rum, and that is 
better than lake water." With that he led them to a fire, 
in whose cheerful glow they stretched themselves. 
On the eve of embarkation, the Green Mountain Boys 
were moved to an angry protest, from commander to the 
humblest private, against Arnold's attempt to assume com- 
mand of the whole force, by virtue of his commission 
from the Massachusetts Committee of Safety. When this 
claim was disposed of, half the troops, the boats being 
too few to transport more, were embarked and went 
forth silently into the darkness. Arriving on the western 
shore without mishap, they restlessly awaited the coming 
of the other half of the force. Their impatience grew 
with every moment when the eastern rim of the skv began 
to pale with the_ first light of dawn, and still no plash of 
oars broke the silence of the quiet waters. 
Allen fretted and fumed, until at last he ordered the 
troops to fall in in three ranks, and briefly set forth the 
danger of the complete failure of the enterprise if they 
watted longer to be joined by their comrades, and pro- 
posed that they should move forward at once. No one 
who disapproved was asked to go; those who followed 
him would poise their firelocks. Every rifle, musket and 
smoothbore was slanted across its owner's breast, and the 
order to march was about to be given, when Arnold again 
made a violent assertion of his right to command. At 
the suggestion by one of Allen's captains that th& two 
should enter the fort together, the dispute was settled, 
when another brief interruption occurred. Some one dis- 
covered a dimly defined object approaching upon the 
lake, which from the morning mists presently took the 
form of a tiny canoe occupied by a solitary figure,, 
"Who goes there?" the challenge was given in a gtiarded 
voice, and the answer came back as guardedly. 
"A friend wi'aout the caountersign ; but maybe some on 
ye knows Kenelm Dalrymple !" A subdued murmiit* of 
applause arose from the column. 
The old man ran the tiny craft upon the beach, ex- 
plaining as he stepped ashore, "I jest got back from 
'mongst the hills a-pickin' up my traps, an' never heard o' 
this job till noon yist-d'y. I wouldn't ha' missed it for a 
fortin'." As he took a place in the ranks, atid the column 
began to move, he continued his confidences in a wdiisper 
to the man beside him. "That 'ere milkweed pod won't 
kerry but one, so I jest put aout alone, an' here 1 be, "The 
boats hadn't but jest got there when I started, an' tlie 
men was iairly b'ilin' for fear o' not gittin 'acrost in 
time. That canew's one I had hid tu the head o' the cove 
sen' last fall trappin', an' it come mighty handy, for 1 
wouldn't 'a' missed hevin' a finger in this pie for a Gov'- 
nor's right o' land. This is the third time I've been ag'in 
Ticonderoga ; the first when Aunt Nabby Crumby Hui 
his pudden-head ag'in it, an' a terrible mess he made on t. 
Then when Amherst come sweepin' the French back intu 
Canerdy an' they blowed ap Carrillew afore aour face an' 
eyes. Lord! It jest rained fort for five minutes! An' 
not a scaout da'st go anigh for an haour! An' naow 
here I be ag'in, an' it's a-hopesin' we'll make a tidier job 
on't." 
The garrulous old ranger ceased his whispered remi- 
tiiscences when the bastions of the fortress arose gray and 
silent before them in the faint light of dawn. Then thj^rc 
was the click of a musket lock luissing fire, a swift ad- 
vance of the column through the narroAv wicket, until the 
la.st man was inside the walls. The troops forming in 
two ranks on the parade, gave a lusty cheer, which the 
barrack wall bandied back and forth in quick reverberri- 
tion that brought the suddenly awakened British soldier-, 
staring out of the windows. 
The peremptory siimmons to surrender quickly fol- 
lowed, and Ticonderoga, its garrison and invaluable stores 
passed bloodlessly into the possession of the Americans. 
Josiah Hill remained there for a time, a member of its in- 
subordinate garrison, imtil upon the organization of the 
regiment of Green Mountain Bovs he enlisted under 
Warner, and went to Canada. Thus he escaped the danger 
of falling a victim to the wiles of Charity Benham. 
Down in the Meadow. 
HoLYOKE, Mass., July 7. — Editor Forest and Slreain: 
Believing that it may interest Pine Tree and other readers 
of the F0RE.ST AND Stream who have, in days gone by, 
fished for trout in the streams in the vicinity of Mt. 
Tom, to peruse a few lines from the pen of one who not 
only now dwells almost within the shadow^ of that moun- 
tain, but who has this season visited some of the neigh- 
boring streams recently mentioned in your columns, this 
brief epistle is submitted. 
How thoroughly Pine Tree knows the territory from 
Springfield to Hatfield ! From the old bed of the West- 
field River, where, as a boy, he shot muskrats in the twi- 
light, to Running Gutter Brook, with its speckled beauties, 
many and many a mile has evidently been traveled by 
him, as with dog and gim or with trout rod, or even a 
birch pole from the brush, he has reveled in the long" 
walks which make glad the heart and keen the eye, store 
the mind with valuable information concerning nature's, 
things and ways, and beget a healthy digestioii iind a. free- 
dom from insomnia. 
But the Cowles Meadow Brook. Ah! here indeed is a 
spot worthy the attention of the enthusiastic angler. What 
must it have been years ago, when a daily catch of a hun- 
dred good trout was not unusual in quite recent days? 
The writer first visited this brook last year, and was re- 
warded on that occasion with a fine string of elegant 
trout. It was a difficult place to fish, and required both 
patience and dexterity, but the fish were certainly there. 
The only cover consisted of dense alders, which, in 
places, thickly lined the banks of the brook and seemed 
to have a special affinity for both hook and line : while in 
the open, one was obliged to stand well back in the slough 
amid the reeds and bogs, and cast with care, for the trout 
in Cowles' Meadow run large and are extremely shy. Not 
unmindful of the sport granted in Cowles' Meadow last 
year, we again made a pilgrimage to Ashfield this spring 
for the express purpose of fishing in this stream, but 
found to our chagrin that the entire meadoAv was not only 
posted, but actually guarded by a special policeman. It 
appears that a club has bought the exclusive right to fish 
the upper meadow, while that portion belonging to Senator 
Barrows is protected because the Senator has, at his own 
expense, recently stocked it with a large number of young 
trout. So we did not fish in the meadoAv that day, but 
contented ourselves along the little streams that 'make 
toward it, and although the catch was fairly large as re- 
gards numbers, the fish were small. 
The Hatfield Brook — the one that runs down by the old 
saw mill, not far from the Williamsburg road, and is 
crossed by the railroad just north of the Hatfield depot — ■ 
furnished two good strings of trout for our table this sea- 
son. The brook is much fished of late, and a large catch is 
rare, but the careful angler can usually count on a few 
ver}' nice trout in the meadow just above the saw mill. 
One morning this May the writer fished through this mead- 
ow only a short distance behind four other fishermen. 
The day was bright, and of cover there is here absolutely 
none. Three of the four fishermen ahead were certainly 
indifferent anglers, for here they did not capture a single, 
trout. The luck of the fourth was not ascertained, but 
presumably it was not much better. Knowing the loca- 
