136 AT THE NORTH OF BEARCAMP WATER. 
more of snow and sunshine. Gnomes live under 
that stump, and the first of my traps was set at 
their cave archway. Kneeling down behind the 
clustering blackberry briers, I could see the 
archway just at the head of the opening between 
two of the great buttress roots of the stump. 
Moss was growing at the threshold, ferns over¬ 
hung the doorway, and a tiny path led through 
the grass from the arch into the dry pasture be¬ 
yond the briers. Yes, the trap had been sprung, 
and crushed beneath its cruel springs was a gray 
gnome. His eyes were large and dark. His 
coat was of soft gray, and his waistcoat snowy. 
His hands and feet were very white and his elfin 
ears mischievously large and erect. The name 
of this gnome is quite musical, — HesperomySj 
the evening gnome. 
In a deep hollow between wooded banks runs 
the pasture brook. It comes from the forest- 
clad mountain-side, and flows to a dark swamp, 
beyond which is the lake. Gnomes live by the 
brook, both in the hollow and in the swamp. 
Nine traps were set in the hollow and eighteen 
in the swamp. These traps are, with true Yan¬ 
kee originality, named “cyclones,” and they are 
nearly perfect as engines of destruction. Upon 
a small square of tin are hinged two rectangles 
of stiff wire, so attached to strong springs that 
they naturally lie flat upon the square of tin. 
