Marooned in the Forest: The Story of a Primitive Fight for Life

by A. Hyatt Verrill

Feeling confident that the lynx had left the vicinity, I again snuggled down in my bunk and slept undisturbed until morning.

But when I stepped out of my cabin the next day the effects of the lynx’s visit were evident. The deadfall was sprung and the bait had been taken, the snow was covered with the big footprints of the creature, and my store of frozen meat was torn to pieces and scattered upon the snow, while a good portion of it had been devoured or carried off by the great cat.

That he would return for more food when darkness fell I was convinced, and I determined to capture him if it was possible. As long as he was at large I could not keep a store of frozen meat in safety, and I thought longingly of his thick fur coat, which would be a most welcome addition to my wardrobe.

As I went into the woods to look at my traps and snares I traced the lynx tracks for some distance, until I reached a spot where he had leaped into a partly fallen tree and the trail was lost.

Thinking this tree might be a regular runway for the creature, I spent some time setting a large and heavy deadfall upon it and then made the rounds of my traps. But I was doomed to disappointment, for a thieving fisher-cat had been before me and only fragments of torn skin and fur, a few drops of blood, and some scattered feathers remained as proofs that my snares had captured hares and partridges.

As long as this thief was about I could not expect to obtain game, for I well knew that once the rascal had discovered my traps he would visit them as regularly as myself, and that it would be necessary to capture him to insure my food-supply.

I had often heard Joe and the other woodsmen tell tales of the sagacity and cunning of the fisher-cats and I realized that I would have a hard task to capture the creature which robbed my traps. Nevertheless, I could but try, and with the greatest care I set a deadfall near each of my traps and arranged the triggers as I had that of the beaver-trap. Then behind each trap I built a little inclosure or fence of sticks, covered this with slabs of bark, and within these placed pieces of the frozen hares left by the lynx.

I then returned to the cabin and in the afternoon set two large deadfalls and baited them with the remains of the hares’ carcasses. During the day I had given a great deal of thought to the capture of the lynx, and various plans had occurred to me which I cast aside as impracticable. Had I possessed any sort of serviceable weapons it would not have been such a difficult matter to kill the beast, for I knew that, driven by hunger, a lynx will become very bold, and that by lying in wait I might easily obtain a good shot at him from within the cabin. I could not throw my spear from inside the hut, however, and I knew how hopeless it would be to attempt to approach the lynx in the open, while to fire at him with my flimsy, bone-tipped arrows would be utterly useless.

This led me to consider the possibility of making a more powerful bow and better arrows. I knew that the Indians used stone-headed weapons in former times and I had often seen the stone arrow-heads and had even found many myself, and, while I was familiar with their appearance, I had no idea how the savages formed them.

But I was convinced that if a naked primitive Indian could make a stone arrow-head, a white man who had overcome as many difficulties as myself should be able to accomplish the same feat, and I decided to try my hand at making stone arrow-heads at once.