FOLLOWING A LOST TRAIL . 
51 
levels. Dozens of these trees had been struck 
by lightning and more or less injured. One 
had been completely shattered and surrounded 
by a spiral abattis of huge splinters stuck firmly 
into the ground. 
The twilight and silence of the forest made 
it restful at first, but as the day wore on, rare 
glimpses of distance and of sunlight were as 
welcome to us as to men confined between 
prison walls. 
We had gone rather more than three miles 
from Berry’s house when our guide paused and 
said: “There, the old road is missing for a 
piece beyond this, and the best we can do is to 
head north and spot the trees as we go.” 
To that point there had been evident, to eyes 
accustomed to forest travel, a difference be¬ 
tween the continuity of large timber and the 
strip once cleared of this timber in order to 
form the road. Looking back, we could see the 
passage; looking forward, there seemed to be 
no trace of it. The greater part of Paugus had 
been passed on our left, and on our right the 
peak of Chocorua, which at Berry’s had been 
northeast, was now a little south of east from 
us. Before us the valley narrowed somewhat, 
and far ahead a continuation of the ridge of 
Paugus seemed to cross the northern sky line 
and approach the northern spurs of Chocorua. 
