The morning was cold, and the boys sat upon the great hearth, with their palms to the fire, getting “good and warm for the day,” while the gray, frosty dawn was slowly frightening the shadows of night away from the forest, to which they seemed to cling.
Then came the mother, who made the breakfast of sweet fried venison, buckwheat-cakes floating in maple syrup and butter, hoe-cake, and eggs. Instead of coffee they drank warm milk, sweetened with maple sugar, and I can tell you it was a breakfast to wax fat on.
The sun was hardly above the horizon, when breakfast was finished, and the dogs and cubs were fed. Then they were harnessed to the wagon, and boys, bears, dogs, and wagon, all started on their way to the woods. Hickory trees did not grow plentifully in the bottom-lands, so the boys made for the hills, perhaps a mile away.
Shortly after they had reached the hills, Jim cried out:—
“Oh, here’s a great big shellbark! I’ll bet the ground’s covered with nuts.”
Sure enough, the ground was covered with them, and the boys filled their wagon in a very short time. Then they started home. The trip home was marred by an upset, owing to the perversity of the cubs; but the boys righted the wagon, loaded it with nuts again, and after considerable trouble deposited them safely at home, and went back for another load.
The dog-bear team worked admirably, barring a general tendency to run over logs and stones, and two great loads of hickory nuts were safely brought to the house before dinner.
After the boys, bears, and dogs had eaten a hurried meal, they again went forth in quest of nuts; but they took a different course this time, toward the south—that is, in the direction of the house of Mr. Fox—for the purpose of visiting a hazel thicket, which was a mile from home. Soon the hazel patch was reached, and about five o’clock the wagon was full of beautiful, brown little nuts, than which there is none sweeter.
When the wagon was loaded the boys hitched up the team, much to the delight of the latter, for by that time the dogs and cubs had come to think it great sport, and the caravan moved homeward.
Soon after leaving the hazel patch, the boys entered a dark strip of woods and undergrowth, through which it was very hard work to draw the wagon. So they attached a long piece of tanned deerskin to the tongue of the wagon, and gave the team a helping hand.