Letters from Muskoka

by Mrs. Charles Gerrard King

We hastily shut the door, and my poor little sister began to cry and bemoan the danger we were in:

“Oh! the roof was so low, and it would clamber up and drop down the chimney, or it would spring through the window, or push open the door,” etc.

I begged her not to frighten the poor children who were playing in a corner, but at once to put more wood on the fire and make a good blaze. I now found that we had hardly any wood without going to the stack outside, which luckily was very close to the door, and fearing that my husband might at any moment return, and be pounced upon unawares, I made my sister light a candle, and opening the door placed her at it, telling her to move the light about so as to bewilder the lynx. Still the dreadful animal remained, uttering cries at intervals, but not moving a step. As quickly as I could I got plenty of wood, as much as I thought would last the night, and very gladly we again shut the door. We now piled up wood on the hearth till there was a great blaze, and no doubt the showers of sparks which must have gone out at the chimney-top greatly alarmed the lynx; it now gave a number of fierce angry cries and went off into the forest, the sound becoming fainter and fainter till it died away.

My husband did not return till the evening of the next day, and he had seen nothing of our unwelcome visitor.

At the time I speak of, the woods of Muskoka were quite infested with wolves, which, however, were only dangerous when many were together. A single wolf is at all times too cowardly to attack a man. My husband knew this, and therefore if he heard a single howl he took no notice, but if he heard by the howling that a pack was in the forest near at hand, he went on his road very cautiously, looking from side to side so as to secure a tree for climbing into should they attack him.

The Canadian wolf has not the audacity of the prairie wolf; should it drive a traveller to the shelter of a tree it will circle round it all night, but at the dawn of day is sure to disappear.

A neighbour’s child, a boy of twelve years old, had a narrow escape from four or five of them, having mistaken them for dogs. It was his business to feed the animals, and having neglected one morning to cut the potatoes small enough, a young calf was unfortunately choked from a piece too large sticking in her throat. The dead calf was laid under a fence not far from the shanty, and the boy having been severely scolded for his carelessness, remained sulkily within doors by himself.

He was engaged in peeling a long stick for an ox-whip, when he heard, as he thought, the barking of some dogs over the dead carcase of the calf; he rushed out with the long stick in his hand, and saw four or five animals busily tearing off the flesh from the calf; without a moment’s reflection he ran in among them, shouting and hallooing with all his might, and so valiantly laid about him with his stick that they all ran off to the covert of the forest, where they turned; and he heard a series of yells and howls which made his blood run cold, for he knew the sound well, and saw that they were wolves and not dogs whose repast he had interrupted. He said, that so great was his terror that he could hardly get back to the shanty and fasten the door.

All the Canadian wild animals are timid; they only begin to prowl about at dusk; they never attempt to enter a dwelling, and have a salutary dread of attacking a man; if attacked themselves they will fight fiercely, and a she-bear with cubs is always dangerous.

Since the time I speak of, the settlements all over the district have become very numerous, and the quantity of land cleared up is so great that the wild animals keep retreating farther and farther into the recesses of the forest; and even the trappers by profession find their trade much less lucrative than it was, they have so much more difficulty in finding game in any quantity.