"Ain't he, now?" complacently said the hunter. "There, heft him; must weigh over half a hundred, and as fat as butter,—for which he is doubtless indebted to the chiefs cornfield. And I presume we may say the same of that streaked squaller of yours, which I see is an uncommonly large, plump fellow. Well," continued the speaker, shouldering the cub, "we may now as well call our hunt over, for to-day,—out of this plaguey hole as soon as we can, and over the lakes to camp, as fast as strong arms and good oars can send us."
On, after reaching and pushing off their now well-freighted canoe, on,—along the extended coast-line of this wild lake, westward to the great inlet, up the gently inflowing waters of that broad, cypress-lined stream, to the Maguntic, and then, tacking eastward, around the borders of that still wilder and more secluded lake,—on, on, they sped for hours, until the ringing of the axe-fall, and the lively echo of human voices in the woods, apprised them of their near approach to the spot which their companions had selected, both for their night's rest and permanent head-quarters for the season.
CHAPTER XIII.
"And now their hatchets, with resounding stroke,
Hew'd down the boscage that around them rose,
And the dry pine of brittle branches broke,
To yield them fuel for the night's repose;
The gathered heap an ample store bespoke.
They smite the steel: the tinder brightly glows,
And the fired match the kindled flames awoke,
And light upon night's seated darkness broke.
High branch'd the pines, and far the colonnade
Of tapering trunks stood glimmering through the glen;
So joyed the hunters in their lonely glade."
"Hurra! the stragglers have arrived!" exclaimed Codman, the first to notice the hunter and Claud as they shot into the mouth of the small, quiet river, on whose bank was busily progressing the work of the incipient encampment. "Hurra for the arrival of the good ship Brag, Phillips, master; but where is his black duck, with a big trout to its foot? Ah, ha! not forthcoming, hey? Kuk-kuk-ke-oh-o!"
"Don't crow till you see what I have got, Mr. Trapper," replied the hunter, running in his canoe by the sides of those of his companions on shore. "Don't crow yet,—especially over the failure of what I didn't undertake: you or Mr. Carvil was to furnish the big trout, you will recollect."
"That has been attended to by me, to the satisfaction of the company, I rather think," remarked Carvil, now advancing towards the bank with the rest. "Not only one big trout, but two more with it, was drawn in by my method, on the way."
"O, accident, accident!" waggishly rejoined the trapper; "they were hooked by mere accident. The fact is, the trouts are so thick in these lakes that a hook and line can't be drawn such a distance through them without getting into some of their mouths. But, allowing it otherwise, it don't cure but half of your case, Mr. Hunter. Where is the black duck?"
"Here is the black duck," responded the hunter, stepping ashore and drawing his cub out from under some screening boughs in the bow of the boat.
A lively shout of laughter burst from the lips of the company at the disclosure, showing alike their amusement at the practical way in which the hunter had turned the jokes of the teasing trapper, and their agreeable surprise at his luck in the uncertain hunting cruise along the shores, on which they, without any expectation of his success, had banteringly dispatched him. "Ah, I think you may as well give up beat, all round, Mr. Codman," observed Mark Elwood, after the surprise and laughter had subsided. "But come up here, neighbor Phillips, and see what a nice place we are going to have for our camp."