Where shrub and vine are intertwining,
Our shanty stands, well roofed with bark,
On which the cheerful blaze is shining.
The smoke ascends in spiral wreath;
With upward curve the sparks are trending;
The coffee kettle sings beneath
Where sparks and smoke with leaves are blending.”
Joe Wayring’s voice rang out loud and clear, and the words of his song were repeated by the echoes from a dozen different points among the hills by which the camp was surrounded on every side. Joe was putting the finishing touches to the roof of a bark shanty; Roy Sheldon, with the aid of a double-bladed camp ax, was cutting a supply of hard wood to cook the trout he had just cleaned; and Arthur Hastings was sitting close by picking browse for the beds. The scene of their camp was a spring-hole, located deep in the forest twelve miles from Indian Lake. Although it was a noted place for trout, it was seldom visited by the guests of the hotels for the simple reason that they did not know that there was such a spring-hole in existence, and the guides were much too sharp to tell them of it.
Hotel guides, as a class, are not fond of work, and neither will they take a guest very far beyond the sound of their employer’s dinner horn. The landlords hire them by the month and the guides get just so much money, no matter whether their services are called into requisition or not. If business is dull and the guests few in number, the guides loaf around the hotel in idleness, and of course the less they do the less they are inclined to do. If they are sent out with a guest, they take him over grounds that have been hunted and fished until there is neither fur, fin, nor feather left, cling closely to the water-ways, avoiding even the shortest “carries,” their sole object being to earn their wages with the least possible exertion. They don’t care whether the guest catches any fish or not. But our three friends, Joe Wayring, Roy Sheldon, and Arthur Hastings, were not dependent upon the hotel guides for sport during their summer outings. Being perfectly familiar with the country for miles around Indian Lake, they went wherever their fancy led them, and with no fear of getting lost.
“And on the stream a light canoe