3w imi 
I^ORBST i^ND STREAM. 
i48 
thing else is smallef save myself. The path has grown up 
with me. The whippoorwill sings on, the katydid like- 
wise, the voice of the frog grows fainter and fainter, and 
I am lost. The bats dart among the tree tops, and the 
fireflies turn oft and turn on the current of their lamps, 
and the darkness deepens. The lost travel in a circle, 
and if the circle be large enough I will come out some- 
where. These woods do not make a forest. I feel the 
ground slope under my feet, and having that in mind I 
walk on until at last there is a light ahead, and breaking 
out of the brush, my feet tread the meadow sward, and 
the stars shine, and one more bright than the rest T think 
may be the Star of the East — the same old star that shone 
over Bethleliem. Then 1 come to the brook again, and 
I lie running water indicates the proper direction, and the 
sound of hoofs and wheels on the distant wooden bridge 
still further directs me. The brook leads by the house, 
and at lo o'clock the wisteria blossoms on the porch send 
out a faint yet sweet welcome. They are waiting for me, 
and while explaining the delay the up-stairs door opens 
and little Ralph, clad in canton flannel robe and eyes 
blinking in the light, climbs into my lap and i have to 
tell him all about the day. Then I play with his toes, 
' This Httle pig went to market," and then carry him up 
stairs to his trundle bed under the eaves, and he wants a 
pillow fight with me. I accommodate him as gently as 
possible, and when tired he clasps his little hands _and 
murmurs: 
"New I lay me down to sleep, 
I pray the Lord my soul to keep ; 
If I slioiald die before I wake, 
I pray the Lord my soul to take " 
It is the province of the old to teach the j oung, but the 
!ittle_fellow reversed conditions with his simple prayer 
that I had alrriost forgotten, and with his "Kiss me good- 
night, Uncle Walter," the warm Httle arms slipped from 
my neck and he was asleep 
My brother was talking to a truck farrrier on the bridge 
over the brook, and asked him who had died in the vv-est 
village 'li was old Luke Whitcomb, but he needn't 
'a' died if he hadn't 'a' done what his wife told him not 
to. He W'ent fox huntin' and pickerel fishin' la.st winter 
and caught cold both times, and now he is a 'goner.' So 
that is your brother? He was in the store up there to- 
day and some of the old fellows remember him, and they 
told me that he used to be the worst boy in tapun." And 
then the truck farmer drove away. 
Then good-by lo "the man with the hoe." 
The good die young, don't you know? 
In being too good you'd better go slow, 
For you don't ahvays reap as you sow 
VV, W. Ha&tiuc-6 
Sam- s Boy.— XVIL 
Cbaaged Lwefc. 
VVhe>j the boy awoke the snovvtall was over and the 
earth asleep under its new unruffled white covering, be- 
neath a sky of breaking clouds and widening patches of 
blue, where stars faded in the growing day. 
The kitchen was aglow with warmth and light, and 
TJnck Lisha was tiptoeing about it in his stockings, in 
anxious quest of some article indispensable to the break- 
fast his unwonted hands were getting, 
"Good airth an' seas!" he whispered, m a blast that 
drove the candle flame aslant, ^'what on airth does the 
women folks du wi' ev'thing? I'd livser make a pair o' 
boots 'd'n tu gjt s meal o' victaals arter '"em! G'aess I'll 
hafter raout aout Jerushy jest tu find the pepper box!" 
But she had already heard him, and came from the bed 
room hurriedly, fumbling with pins whose use was uncom- 
prehended by the masculine mind. 
"Why, fathei, what be von a-tryrn' tu du?" she asked iti 
wonder at the old man's strange occupation 
"A-geuin' Bub some breakius', that's what," he an- 
swered testily. 
"What, for this precious child? Then why on airth 
didn't j'ou call me? " she demanded, resentful of such 
usurpation of her rights. 'Or'nary men folks don't 'pear 
m hev much knack o' gittin' breaktus'," Then, relenting, 
she hastened to concede, "But this 'ere warmed-up 'tater 
does look proper good, father." 
Between them, the boy was provided with a nice, hot 
breakfast, 'as the hound was with one as much to his 
liking, and the two went forth to the snowy world 
hami.'i.'Hr objects looked strange, their angles rounded 
ia their sporles.^ new guise, but woodpile, unho'used cart, 
the tenautless hen coops and the scraggy apple trees soon 
assumed recognizable shapes. A track showed far away 
on the even whiteness of the fields, and as Sammy looked 
heyond the dotted blue line that the hound was printing 
he saw a 'daiiitier one lending toward Hedgehog Hill, 
the old vixen's, no douI>t. which he thought, in vexation 
of spirit, could only lead to failure. Then he remembered 
haw, when she led away into I he hills, she had always 
a trick of inounting two cross walls and going back and 
forth on thein, and giving the hounds a tangle that usually 
ended the day's pur.suit of her. . 
Now Sammy Ijethought him that if lie could but get 
■there liefore^ her and ambush himself, the long-desired 
shot might be obtained. 
lie was nat in the secret ol the old hunters, who would 
be- loath indeed to have their poultry-breeding women 
folk know h'pw carefully they spared the arch raider of 
flocks — he only thought it the greater glory to circum- 
vent her cimning. So, when Drive announced the 
warmth of the scent with a loud and jubilant note, he 
made all haste toward the place. Assured that he was 
keeping to the leeward, he had the satisfaction of know- 
ing by the voice of the hound that the fox was still veer- 
ing away dia:gonally, and so giving him more time to 
reach rhe cross vvall first. Now he came to the foot of the 
loiig= rough slope, down which one of the walls ran. 
He climbed over it, and began the slippery ascent — and 
how steep and long and slippery it was, as he stooped 
iow and slipped and tumbled along with his last breath 
almost spent. It seemed as if he never should get his 
breath again, nor quiet the beating of his heart, so that 
he could hear the voice of the hound, till he Vv-as close 
upon him. But. in spite of the hammering of his heart, 
even now he heard in the distance the swelling and 
falling cadence of Dfive',s tuneful voice regularly draw- 
ing nearer, and now he lifted his head cautiously above 
the snow-capped wall, and acre by acre scanned the 
broad fields. 
The expanse, of even whiteness was taking on light 
and shade and color now. The growing dawn flushed the 
broken clouds with salmon tint, the edges bordered the 
blue sky with nacreous hues. The snow ridges were 
flushed with the repeated colors, while the hollows were 
lined with blue, Then away where the bugle-like notes were 
sounding, Sammy descried a dark speck moving across 
.T ridge, and then it disappeared in a hollow, and the 
niu.sic grew fainter. A smaller speck came into view on 
a nearer crest, and that he knew was the fox, now: circling 
on the half-naked ground under a group of tent-like 
evergreens, now taking a fence top, yet surely drawing 
nearer When he was once assured of this, Sammy's heart 
became more turbulent than fast walking had made it, ' 
and so near choking him that it seemed as if he could ■ 
never live till the fox came within shot. 
On she came, now no longer a speck, now brush, nov,^ 
legs, now ears, defined against the shining background,, 
and now far down its lenght she sprang lightly" to tlie 
top of one wall, half turned and looked toward the pur- 
suing hound, and then, v>'ith long leaps, Avent down the 
wall out of sight beyond the brovv of the hill. Was this 
some variation of her usual tricks, and was she gone for 
good and all? the boy asked himself with a sinking heart. 
Two minutes went by with not a sight of her, and he 
was about climbing the wall for a farewell look. But just 
m the nick of time he saw her returning, running at long 
leaps a little distance from the wail till she was past the 
place w^here she first came to it, when she again sprang 
to the top of it and came picking her way toward the 
four corners. Somehow, for all the fox returned so sud- 
denly, the boy's heart did not fall into- such a wild tumult 
a-: before When he raised his gun slowly to his cheek 
the muzzle didn't wobble it was the old she fox of 
Hedgehog Bill, sure enough, her grizzle mask, her ears 
notched in many a vulpine squabble, that were pricked so 
intently to every note of the hound, her eyes so expressive 
of cunning. Alas! for her, that they were not looking 
further ahead to see the danger that lay crouching where 
she so confidently sought safety. 
Now she halted and half turned to look and hsten to 
that tireless baying hound, who was soon to be counted 
out of the game when she should take her ease on some 
fir-embowered rock of the mountain steeps But the 
deadly aim was upon her even now; there was a deafen- 
ing noise in her eai s like a burst of midsummer thunder 
and a great cloud of white smoke unrolled upon her, in 
the midst of which she was smitten down into the snow 
by a deadly pang boring its way into her side. Sammy 
did not wait to climb the wall, but tumbled over it pell- 
mell, taking the top stones with him, and scarcely re- 
gaming his feet before he reached his victim. 
When he saw her lying there unable to rise, yet turning 
an alert eye upon hirn, vvhile her life's blood was spend- 
ing, his luck seemed too good to be true, and as he 
slowly realized it, he was ready to laugti, cry or shout for 
joy, and combined the three in a sound so strange that it 
startled him. - 
The hound was drawing near, and as his . eager n'Otes 
pierced the clouded senses of the dying fox she lifted her 
head and made a desperate but futile struggle to get to her 
feet. Sammy had heard of foxes escaping even at such a 
pass, and prudently set his foot upon her neck, but the 
dog was -upon her in an insta-nt, and he got his foot out 
of danger without delay, whereupon the fox seized Drive 
by the nose and got one last sweet morsel of revenge 
that was d'aly acknowledge by a yell of pain and rage 
Then vvith a savage crunch the life was shaken out of 
the gallant old vixen. 
There "would be no more laughirig at the boy, now that 
he had circumvented the tricks of this wary old mother 
of freebooters without help or advice from any one. and 
tor whose death every pouitry-breeder in Danvis would 
be thankful; nor co'uld any one szy this was a chance 
,si:ot; when the thickly punctured pelt should show how 
true the aim was. It was glory enough for one day, and 
there was nothing to do now but take off the skin and 
carry it home in triumph. 'Yet it was not to be just so, 
for when he Vv'ent into his pockets, lo! his knife vv^as not 
in any of them! So long useless, it was quite forgotten. 
So he shouldered the fox, and with Drive foliov,fing after 
a long wistful look backward at the wooded_ steeps, set 
forth homeward, as happy a boy as the world held. 
Rowland E. Robinson. 
[to be CONTINtlED,] 
Maicli Storms and Boh White^ 
Alma,. J^lich., March 20. — Editor Forest and Streamj . 
It begins to look as though the heavy storm of March 
S and 6 was proving disastrous to our friend, Bob White- 
It snovved all day the 5th, and late at night turned to hail 
and sleet, so that the morning of the 6th found every- 
thing coated with ice, so 'the little fellows " under the 
drifts woke up m a crystal palace, which undoubtedly 
proved their tomb: for the cold continued for three 'days 
before the crust was softened or the icy mail disappeared 
trom the weeds and twigs. A hasty council of local 
sportsmen was held and resulted in men being sent out 
in different directions -with bags of grain to points where' 
quail were seen before the storm, and properly placed for 
the benefit of the survivors. One man just west of town , 
ran across a bevy in the road, and so hungry ^^ere they ' 
that thej- were reluctant to leave the track where they 
were picking, and stepped aside just to let his liprse- pass. ' 
Up to the date above mentioned all was "merry as a 
marriage bell" with the birds, the -ivinter being- mild and 
open through central Michigan, and we looked "for birds in 
plentj' later in the year; but reports now coming in are 
discouraging. However, there were rnany birds left over 
last autumn, and it is hoped more survived the storm than 
now appears probable ' Alma, 
The largest fish ever taken at Jf aim tseach ivith a jod and line 
was caught Saturday by E, M. Sherriii, of Keokuk, la., -A-ho is a 
guest at the Royal Poinciana. it v.'ss a shark, and was nearly 8 
feet in length and -weighed fully 300 po-ands. Mr, Sherriii was 
fishing -with a tackle suited for amber.iack •i\-hen he hooked the 
shark. He played the big fi.sh for fifty-five minutes, and was 
then able to pull it up close enough to kill it by firing several 
revolver shots into its head. Mr. Sherriii -will have the skin 
mounted as a memento of his e^i "'t-^Sa-vannah, Ga,, News. 
The Harriman Alaska Expedition. 
VI.— -lodlaas. 
Not very far from Point Gustavus, on Muir Inlet, was 
a small village of Hunyah Indians from Chichagof 
island, camped here for the purpose of fishing and seal 
hunting. Several times during the day canoes were seen 
covered with white cloth, and with occupants in white, 
so as to resemble a small berg of floating ice. The seal 
hunters were armed with rifles. This village was on the 
beach at high water mark. It had not been long estab- 
lished, and was very clean. Fish, which looked like 
salmon, were drying on the scaffolds, several seal car- 
casses were lying about on the beach, and were not dis- 
turbed by dogs, showing that food was- abundant. The 
sbelters occupied by the Indians were made of bark, oval, 
and with a smoke-hole in the middle. There were one 
or two canvas tents. 
At three points on the south side of Yakutat Bay 
were camps of Indians, occupied by people from a dis- 
tance, who had come here for the seal hunting. The 
three camps were near each other and represented In- 
dians from different localities. They were on the beach, 
just above high water mark, and consisted chiefly of 
canvas wall tents, among which, however, were some of 
the primitive square summer shelters. These are covered 
with spruce bark, in strips from i foot to 18 inches wide 
and 6, 8 or 10 feet long, laid on a frame and held in place 
by slender poles placed on them. Really the shelters are 
little more than sheds, though often on the windward side 
strips of bark or dried seal skins still on the frames, stand, 
against the shed to make a wind-break. The fire burns 
in the center, and over it, resting on stones, is the pot, 
full of strips of seal blubber, from which the oil is being 
tried out. When this is done, the oil is ladled out of the 
kettle into small kegs or old kerosene oil cans, or into the 
ornamented rectangular cedar wood boxes of primitive 
type. 
These boxes are beautifully made and very interest- 
ing. Each one consists of three pieces — a top or 
cover, a bottom and the four sides, these last being in a 
single piece-^cut part way through, where each angle of 
the box is to come, so that if these divisions were cut 
entirely through the board, which is to form the sides, it 
VN^ould be in four pieces. The wood is then steamed 
opposite each line of cutting, and is bent at these lines, 
which thus begin to form the angles of the box, and are 
at last bent so that each two adjacent sides stand at right 
angles to each other, and the extremities of the board 
now meei;. also at right angles. These extremities 
are now trimmed to' form a tight joint, and this joint is 
fastened by ;sew;ing together the two edges with steamed 
cedar twigs. The bottom is sewed to the sides with 
twigs, the jomt being so neatly fitted that the vessel will 
hold oil without leaking. When finished, the box is likely 
to be painted red and black, with the curious totemic 
ornamentation aiiected by ^hese Indians, and the com- 
pleted vessel is used to hold oil, and often lasts for many 
i^ears, sometimes descending from one generation to a - 
other, _ I T ,i| 
Within the shelters, from the slender poles which sup- 
port the roof, hangs food of various sorts; seal flippers, 
still covered with skin; sides of ribs; strips of blubber an 
mch thick and 18 inches long, sometimes braided about 
with the intestines of the seal ; pieces of loin, and many 
other delicacies. In some of the houses women were seen 
roasting the un skinned seal flippers over the fire. When 
they were cooked they pulled them off the coals, heated, 
an iron in the^ire and singed of? the hair which remained 
on the skin. The flipper was then torn to pieces and the 
meat picked from the bones. 
_ Just outside several of the shelters stood four stakes 
tiriven in the ground at the angles of a rough square, each 
side of which measured 3 feet. Four other poles lashed 
to the top of these stakes made a rectangular frame, to 
which was laced the border of a seal skin, which hung 
down within the frame so as to, form a bag or kettle- 
shaped sack, which might hold between one and two 
bushels. This -yvas filled with strips of blubber waiting 
to be tried out. = This is the primitive kettle of all North 
-rVmerican tribes. 
In model the canoes of these Indians are unlike those in 
use further south. Below the prow or point at the bow 
where the gun-vvales come together they are distinctly 
cut away, and below this a cutwater projects again 8 or 
10 inches, its upper edge being above the water's sur- 
face. .This form of bow has a manifest use, namely, to 
push away the ice cakes which are constantly floating in 
the water, and to prevent them from knocking against 
and_ chafing the sides of the canoe. The cutwater is often 
bruised and battered, and the sides of canoes long in use 
are also more or less rough and splintered by contact with 
the ice and with the stones of the beach, over which they 
are continually drawn in and out of the water. 'The 
canoes. are hollowed o'ut'of a single spruce log, and even 
with, modern tools the work of making them Is consider- 
able. 
■\ _ Seal oil is a necessity to these people. It- forms a con- 
.siderable part of their food, is used for cooking, as a 
beverage, to preserve berries in, and for various other 
purposes. The flesh of the seal is eaten, arid its hide is 
ttsed, but neither of these purooses alone vv'ould cause the 
animal tp be so systematically pursued. The flesh and 
the skin are only obtajn.ed incidentally. The' oil is what 
the. Indians seek in their seal fisheries. ''"''^l 
Yakutat Bay is the greatest hair sealirig. ^ground on 
the Alaska coast, and here in summer frGm:.300-to 400 
people gather, from SitVa, Juneau and Yakutat, to secure 
their year's supply of oil- 
The seals ure hunted in small canoes, holding two 
people. Sometimes one is occupied by a man and his 
wife, or perhaps by a man and a boy or two men. One 
sits in the bow, the other m the stern, and amidships the 
canoe is steadied by three or four great stones, weighing 
in the aggregate 150 pounds The occupants sit or kneel 
on little platforms fitted mto bo-w or stern or perhaps on 
a pile of branches covered with a blanket, a skin or a coat, 
so as to keep them out of the water, of which there is 
always more or less in the canoe. 
On the right side of the bow man and projecting out 
over the water is the barrel of a Winchester rifle or of 
a double barrel shotgun and a seal spear 10 or 12 feet 
