"'Now,' said he,' gentlemen, that button has to be fastened;' and he fired, and drove the nail that it hung on into the tree. 'And now, gentlemen,' said he, 'I have stood your shots for many a long day, turn about is fair play. The first man that cracks a joke at me, on account of my calling, must stand my shot, and 'if I don't stitch his button-hole for him, I am no tailor; that's all.'

"Well, they all cheered him when he sat down, and they drank his health; and the boss of the day said: 'Well, Street (afore that he used to call him Thimble), well, Street,' said he, 'you are a man.'

"'There you are again,' said Street, 'that is a covered joke at a tailor being only the ninth part of one. I pass it over this time, but let's have no more of it.'

"'No, Sirree, no,' said boss, 'on honour now, I didn't mean it. And I say, too, let there be no more of it.'"

"Not a bad story!" said the doctor. "A man ought to be able to take his own part in the world; but my idea is we think too much of guns. Do you know anything of archery?"

"A little," sais I, "at least folks say so; but then they really give me credit for what I don't deserve; they say I draw a thunderin' long bow sometimes."

"Oh! oh!" he said laughing, "positively, as the fellow said to the tailor, you'll give me a stitch in my side. Well, that's better than being 'sewed up,' as Jehu was last night. But, seriously, do you ever use the bow?"

"Well, I have tried the South American bow, and it's a powerful weapon that; but it takes a man to draw it, I tell you."

"Yes," said he, "it requires a strong arm; but the exercise is good for the chest. It's the one I generally use. The bow is a great weapon, and the oldest in the world. I believe I have a tolerable collection of them. The Indian bow was more or less excellent, according to the wood they had; but they never could have been worth much here, for the country produces no suitable material. The old English long-bow perhaps is a good one; but it is not so powerful as the Turkish. That has immense power. They say it will carry an arrow from four hundred and fifty to five hundred yards. Mine perhaps is not a first-rate one, nor am I what I call a skilful archer; but I can reach beyond three hundred yards—though that is an immense distance. The gun has superseded them; but though superior in many respects, the other has some qualities that are invaluable. In skirmishing, or in surprising outposts, what an advantage it is to avoid the alarm and noise occasioned by firearms. All troops engaged in this service in addition to the rifle ought to have the bow and the quiver. What an advantage it would have been in the Caffre war, and how serviceable now in the Crimea. They are light to carry and quickly discharged. When we get to my house I will prove it to you. We will set up two targets, at one hundred yards, say. You shall fire from one to the other, and then stand aside, and before you can reload I will put three arrows into yours. I should say four to a common soldier's practice; but I give even you three to one. If a man misses his first shot at me with a gun, he is victimized, for I have three chances in return before he gets his second, and if I don't pink him with one or the other—why, I deserve to be hit. For the same reason, what a glorious cavalry weapon it is, as the Parthians knew. What a splendid thing for an ambush, where you are neither seen nor heard. I don't mean to say they are better than fire-arms; but, occasionally used with them they would be irresistible. If I were a British officer in command I would astonish the enemy."

"You would astonish the Horse-Guards, too, I know," said I. "It would ruin you for ever. They'd call you old 'bows and arrows,' as they did the general that had no flints to his guns, when he attacked Buonus Ayres; they'd have you up in 'Punch;' they'd draw you as Cupid going to war; they'd nickname you a Bow-street officer. Oh! they'd soon teach you what a quiver was. They'd play the devil with you. They'd beat you at your own game; you'd be stuck full of poisoned arrows. You could as easily introduce the queue again, as the bow."

"Well, Cressy, Poictiers, and Agincourt were won with the bow," he said, "and, as an auxiliary weapon, it is still as effective as ever. However that is not a mere speculation. When I go out after cariboo, I always carry mine, and seldom use my gun. It don't alarm the herd; they don't know where the shaft comes from, and are as likely to look for it in the lake or in the wild grass as anywhere else. Let us try them together. But let us load with shot now. We shall come to the brook directly, and where it spreads out into still water, and the flags grow, the wild fowl frequent; for they are amazin' fond of poke-lokeins, as the Indians call those spots. We may get a brace or two perhaps to take home with us. Come, let us push ahead, and go warily."

After awhile a sudden turn of the road disclosed to us a flock of blue-winged ducks, and he whispered, "Do you fire to the right, and I will take the left." When the smoke from our simultaneous discharges cleared away, we saw the flock rise, leaving five of their number as victims of their careless watch.

"That is just what I said," he remarked, "the gun is superior in many respects; but if we had our bows here, we would have had each two more shots at them, while on the wing. As it is, we can't reload till they are out of reach. I only spoke of the how as subordinate and auxiliary; but never as a substitute. Although I am not certain that, with our present manufacturing skill, metallic bows could not now be made, equal in power, superior in lightness, and more effective than any gun when the object to be aimed at is not too minute, for in that particular the rifle will never be equalled—certainly not surpassed."

The retriever soon brought us our birds, and we proceeded leisurely on our way, and in a short time were overtaken by the waggons, when we advanced together towards the house, which we reached in about an hour more. As soon as we came in sight of it, the dogs gave notice of our approach, and a tall, straight, priggish-looking man marched, for he did not hurry himself, bareheaded towards the bars in the pole fence. He was soon afterwards followed by a little old woman at a foot amble, or sort of broken trot, such as distinguishes a Naraganset pacer. She had a hat in her hand, which she hastily put on the man's head. But, as she had to jump up to do it, she effected it with a force that made it cover his eyes, and nearly extinguish his nose. It caused the man to stop and adjust it, when he turned round to his flapper, and, by the motion of his hand, and her retrogade movement, it appeared he did not receive this delicate attention very graciously. Duty however was pressing him, and he resumed his stately step towards the bars.

She attacked him again in the rear, as a goose does an intruder, and now and then picked something from his coat, which I supposed to be a vagrant thread, or a piece of lint or straw, and then retreated a step or two to avoid closer contact. He was compelled at last to turn again on his pursuer, and expostulate with her in no gentle terms. I heard the words "mind your own business," or something of the kind, and the female voice more distinctly (women always have the best of it), "You look as if you had slept in it. You ain't fit to appear before gentlemen." Ladies she had been unaccustomed of late to see, and therefore omitted altogether. "What would Colonel Jones say if he saw you that way?"

To which the impatient man replied: "Colonel Jones be hanged. He is not my commanding officer, or you either—take that will you, old ooman." If the colonel was not there his master was, therefore pressing forward he took down the bars, and removed them a one side, when he drew himself bolt upright, near one of the posts, and placing his hand across his forehead, remained in that position, without uttering a word, till the waggons passed, and the doctor said, "Well, Jackson, how are you?" "Hearty, Sir! I hope your Honour is well? Why, Buscar, is that you, dog; how are you, my man?" and then he proceeded very expeditiously to replace the poles.

"What are you stopping for?" said the doctor to me, for the whole party was waiting for us.

"I was admirin' of them bars," said I.

"Why, they are the commonest things in the country," he replied. "Did you never see them before?" Of course I had, a thousand times, but I didn't choose to answer.

"What a most beautiful contrivance," said I, "they are. First, you can't find them, if you don't know beforehand where they are, they look so like the rest of the fence. It tante one stranger in a thousand could take them down, for if he begins at the top they get awfully tangled, and if he pulls the wrong way, the harder he hauls the tighter they get. Then he has to drag them all out of the way, so as to lead the horse through, and leave him standin' there till he puts them up agin, and as like as not, the critter gets tired of waitin', races off to the stable, and breaks the waggon all to flinders. After all these advantages, they don't cost but a shilling or so more than a gate. Oh, it's grand."

"Well, well," said the doctor, "I never thought of that afore, but you are right after all," and he laughed as good humouredly as possible. "Jackson," said he.

"Yes, your Honour."

"We must have a gate there."

"Certainly," said the servant, touching his hat. But he honoured me with a look, as much as to say, "Thank you for nothing, Sir. It's a pity you hadn't served under Colonel Jones, for he would have taught you to mind your own business double quick."

We then proceeded to the door, and the doctor welcomed the party to the "Bachelor Beaver's-dam," as he called it. In the mean time, the bustling little old woman returned, and expressed great delight at seeing us. The place was so lonesome, she said, and it was so pleasant to see ladies there, for they were the first who had ever visited the doctor, and it was so kind of them to come so far, and she hoped they would often honour the place with their presence, if they could put up with their accommodation, for she had only heard from the doctor the night before; and she was so sorry she couldn't receive them as she could wish, and a whole volume more, and an appendix longer than that, and an index to it, where the paging was so jumbled you couldn't find nothin'.

Jackson joined in, and said he regretted his commissariat was so badly supplied. That it was a poor country to forage in, and that there was nothing but the common rations and stores for the detachment stationed there. But that nothing should be wanting on his part, and so on. The housekeeper led the way to the apartments destined for the girls. Peter assisted the boy to unharness the horses, and the doctor showed Cutler and myself into the hall, where the breakfast table was set for us. Seeing Jackson marching to the well, as if he was on parade, I left the two together in conversation, and went out to talk to him. "Sergeant," sais I.

"Yes, your Honour," said he, and he put down the pail, and raised his hand to his forehead.

"I understand you have seen a great deal of service in your time."

"Yes, Sir," said he, looking well pleased, and as if his talking tacks were all ready. I had hit the right subject. "I ave gone through a deal of soldiering in my day, and been in many a ard fight, Sir."

"I see you have the marks on you," I said. "That is a bad scar on your face."

"Well, Sir," said he, "saving your presence, I wish the devil had the Frenchman that gave me that wound. I have some I am proud of having received in the service of my king and country. I have three balls in me now, which the doctors couldn't extract, and nothin' but death will bring to the light of day again, if they can be said to be seen in the grave. But that scar is the only disgraceful mark I ever received since I first joined in 1808.

"When we were laying siege to Badajoz, Sir, I was in the cavalry, and I was sent with a message to a brigade that was posted some distance from us. Well, Sir, as I was trotting along, I saw a French dragoon, well mounted, leading a splendid spare orse, belonging to some French hofficer of rank, as far as I could judge from his happearance and mountings. Instead of pursuing my course, as I ought to have done, Sir, I thought I'de make a dash at the rascal, and make prize of that are hanimal. So I drew my sword, raised myself in my saddle (for I was considered a first-rate swordsman, as most Hinglishmen hare who have been used to the single-stick), and made sure I ad him. Instead of turning, he kept steadily on, and never as much as drew his sabre, so in place of making a cut hat him, for I'de scorn to strike han hunarmed man, my play was to cut is reins, and then if he wanted a scrimmage, to give him one, and if not, to carry off that hare orse.

"Well, Sir, he came on gallantly, I must say that, and kept his eye fixed steadily on me, when just as I was going to make a cut at his reins, he suddenly seized his eavy-mounted elmet, and threw it slap at my face, and I'll be anged if it didn't stun me, and knock me right off the orse flat on the ground, and then he galloped off as ard as he could go. When I got up, I took his elmet under my harm, and proceeded on my route. I was ashamed to tell the story straight, and I made the best tale I could of the scrimmage, and showed the elmet in token that it was a pretty rough fight. But the doctor, when he dressed the wound, swore it never was made with a sword, nor a bullet, nor any instrument he knew hon, and that he didn't think it was occasioned by a fall, for it was neither insised, outsised, nor contused—but a confusion of all three. He questioned me as close as a witness.

"'But,' sais I, 'doctor, there is no telling what himplements Frenchmen ave. They don't fight like us, they don't. It was a runnin' scrimmage, or handicap fight.' Yes, Sir, if it was hanywhere helse, where it wouldn't show, it wouldn't be so bad, but there it is on the face, and there is no denyin' of it."

Here the little woman made her appearance again, with the hat in her hand, and said imploringly:

"Tom, doee put your hat on, that's a good soul. He don't take no care of himself, Sir," she said, addressing herself to me. "He has seen a deal of service in his day, and has three bullets in him now, and he is as careless of hisself as if he didn't mind whether I was left alone in the oulin' wilderness or not. Oh, Sir, if you heard the wild beastesis here at night, it's dreadful. It's worse than the wolves in the Pyreen, in Spain. And then, Sir, all I can do, I can't get him to wear is at, when he knows in is eart he had a stroke of the sun near Badajoz, which knocked him off his orse, and see how it cut his face. He was so andsome before, Sir."

"Betty," said the sergeant, "the doctor is calling you. Do go into the ouse, and don't bother the gentleman. Oh, Sir," said he, "I have had to tell a cap of lies about that are scar on my face, and that's ard, Sir, for a man who has a medal with five clasps; ain't it?"

Here the doctor came to tell me breakfast was ready.

"I was admiring, Doctor," said I, "this simple contrivance of yours for raising water from the well. It is very ingenious."

"Very," he said, "but I assure you it is no invention of mine. I have no turn that way. It is very common in the country."

I must describe this extraordinary looking affair, for though not unusual in America, I have never seen it in England, although the happy thought doubtless owes its origin to the inventive genius of its farmers.

The well had a curb, as it is called, a square wooden box open at the top, to prevent accident to the person drawing the water. A few paces from this was an upright post about twelve feet high, having a crotch at the top. A long beam lies across this, one end of which rests on the ground at a distance from the post, and the other projects into the air with its point over the well. This beam is secured in the middle of the crotch of the upright post by an iron bolt, on which it moves, as on an axle. To the aerial end is attached a few links of a chain, that hold a long pole to which the bucket is fastened, and hangs over the well. The beam and its pendent apparatus resembles a fishing-rod and its line protruding over a stream. When a person wishes to draw water, he takes hold of the pole, and as he pulls it down, the bucket descends into the well, and the heavy end of the beam rises into the air, and when the pail is filled the weight of the butt end of the beam in its descent raises the bucket.

"Now," said I, "Doctor, just observe how beautiful this thing is in operation. A woman (for they draw more nor half the water used in this country) has to put out all her strength, dragging down the pole, with her hands over her head (an attitude and exercise greatly recommended by doctors to women), in order to get the bucket down into the well. If she is in too big a hurry, the lever brings it up with a jerk that upsets it, and wets her all over, which is very refreshing in hot weather, and if a child or a dog happens to be under the heavy end of the beam, it smashes it to death, which after all ain't no great matter, for there are plenty left to them who have too many and don't care for 'em. And then if it ain't well looked after and the post gets rotten at the bottom, on a stormy day it's apt to fall and smash the roof of the house in, which is rather lucky, for most likely it wanted shingling, and it is time it was done. Well, when the bucket swings about in the wind, if a gall misses catching it, it is apt to hit her in the mouth, which is a great matter, if she has the tooth-ache, for it will extract corn-crackers a plaguey sight quicker than a dentist could to save his soul."

"Well," said he, "I never thought of that before. I have no turn for these things, I'll have it removed, it is a most dangerous thing, and I wouldn't have an accident happen to the sergeant and dear old Betty for the world."

"God bless your Honour for that," said Jackson.

"But, Doctor," said I, "joking apart, they are very picturesque, ain't they, how well they look in a sketch, eh! nice feature in the foreground."

"Oh," said he, patting me on the back, "there you have me again, Slick. Oh, indeed they are, I can't part with my old well-pole, oh, no, not for the world: Jackson, have an eye to it, see that it is all safe and strong and that no accident happens, but I don't think we need take it away. Come, Slick, come to breakfast."

Thinks I to myself, as I proceeded to the hall, "there are two classes only in this world. Those who have genius, and those who have common sense. They are like tailors, one can cut a coat and do nothin' else, for he is an artist. The other can put the parts together, for he is a workman only. Now the doctor is a man of talent and learning, an uncommon man, but he don't know common things at all. He can cut out a garment, but he can't stitch a button-hole."



CHAPTER IX. THE PLURAL OF MOOSE.

The room in which we breakfasted was about eighteen feet square, having a large old-fashioned fire-place opposite to the front door, which opened directly on the lawn. The walls were fancifully ornamented with moose and deer horns, fowling-pieces, fishing-rods, landing nets and baskets, bows and arrows of every description, and Indian relics, such as stone hatchets, bowls, rude mortars, images, war clubs, wampum, and implements not unlike broad swords made of black birch, the edges of which were inlaid with the teeth of animals, or the shells of fish, ground sharp. Besides these, were skulls of great size and in good preservation, stone pipes, pouches, and so on; also some enormous teeth and bones of an antediluvian animal, found in the Bras Dor lake in Cape Breton. It was, take it altogether, the most complete collection of relics of this interesting race, the Micmacs, and of natur's products to be found in this province. Some of the larger moose horns are ingeniously managed, so as to form supports for polished slabs of hardwood for tables. The doctor informed me that this department of his museum was under the sole direction of the sergeant, who called it his armoury, and to whose experience in the arrangement of arms he was indebted for the good effect they produced. The only objection he said he had to it was, that classification had been sacrificed to appearance, and things were very much intermixed; but his collection was too small to make this a matter of any importance.

Jackson, as soon as the doctor was similarly engaged in showing them to the captain and the Miss McDonalds, for whom they seemed to have a peculiar interest, mounted guard over me.

"You see, Sir," said he, "the moose horns are the only thing of any size here, and that's because the moose is half English, you know. Everything is small in this country, and degenerates, Sir. The fox ain't near as big as an English one. Lord, Sir, the ounds would run down one o' these fellows in ten minutes. They haven't got no strength. The rabbit too is a mere nothink; he is more of a cat, and looks like one too, when he is hanged in a snare. It's so cold, nothin' comes to a right size here. The trees is mere shrubbery compared to our hoaxes. The pine is tall, but then it has no sap. It's all tar and turpentine, and that keeps the frost out of its heart. The fish that live under the ice in the winter are all iley, in a general way, like the whales, porpoises, dog-fish, and cod. The liver of the cod is all ile, and women take to drinkin' it now in cold weather to keep their blood warm. Depend upon it, Sir, in two or three generations they will shine in the sun like niggers. Porter would be better for 'em to drink than ile, and far more pleasanter too, Sir, wouldn't it? It would fill 'em out. Saving your presence, Sir, you never see a girl here with—"

"Hush! the ladies will hear you," I said.

"I ax your Honour's pardon; perhaps I am making too bold, but it's nateral for a man that has seed so much of the world as I have to talk a bit, especially as my tongue is absent on furlough more nor half the year, and then the old 'ooman's goes on duty, and never fear, Sir, her'n don't sleep at its post. She has seen too much sarvice for that. It don't indeed. It hails every one that passes the sentry-box, and makes 'em advance and give the countersign. A man that has seed so much, Sir, in course has a good deal to talk about. Now, Sir, I don't want to undervaly the orns at no rate, but Lord bless you, Sir, I have seen the orns of a wild sheep, when I was in the Medeteranion, so large, I could hardly lift them with one hand. They say young foxes sleep in them sometimes. Oh, Sir, if they would only get a few of them sheep, and let them loose here, there would be some fun in unting of them. They are covered over with air in summer, and they are so wild you can't take them no other way than by shooting of them. Then, Sir, there is the orns of—"

"But how is the moose half English?" sais I.

"Why, Sir, I heard our colour-sergeant M'Clure say so when we was in Halifax. He was a great reader and a great arguer, Sir, as most Scotchmen are. I used to say to him, 'M'Clure, it's a wonder you can fight as well as you do, for in England fellows who dispute all the time commonly take it all out in words.'

"One day, Sir, a man passed the north barrack gate, tumping (as he said, which means in English, Sir, hauling) an immense bull moose on a sled, though why he didn't say so, I don't know, unless he wanted to show he knew what M'Clure calls the botanical word for it. It was the largest hanimal I ever saw here."

"Says Mac to him, 'What do you call that creature?'

"'Moose,' said he.

"'Do you pretend to tell me,' said Mac, 'that that henormous hanimal, with orns like a deer, is a moose?'

"'I don't pretend at all,' said he; 'I think I hought to know one when I see it, for I have killed the matter of a undred of them in my day.'

"'It's a daumed lee,' said the sergeant. 'It's no such thing; I wouldn't believe it if you was to swear to it.'

"'Tell you what,' said the man, 'don't go for to tell me that again, or I'll lay you as flat as he is in no time,' and he cracked his whip and moved on.

"'What's the use,' said I, 'M'Clure, to call that man a liar? How do you know whether it is a moose or not, and he is more like to get its name right than you, who never saw one afore.'

"'Moose,' said he, 'do you take me for a fool? do you suppose he is a goin' to cram me with such stuff as that? The idea of his pretending to tell me that a creature six feet high with great spreading antlers like a deer is a moose, when in fact they are no bigger than a cock-roach, and can run into holes the size of a sixpence! Look at me—do you see anything very green about me?'

"'Why, Mac,' sais I, 'as sure as the world you mean a mouse.'

"'Well, I said a moose,' he replied.

"'Yes, I know you said a moose, but that's not the way to pronounce a mouse. It may be Scotch, but it ain't English. Do you go into that hardware shop, and ask for a moose-trap, and see how the boys will wink to each other, and laugh at you.'

"'A man,' sais he, drawing himself up, 'who has learned humanity at Glaskee, don't require to be taught how to pronounce moose.'

"'As for your humanity,' said I, 'I never see much of that. If you ever had that weakness, you got bravely over it, and the glass key must have been broke years agone in Spain.'

"'You are getting impertinent,' said he, and he walked off and left me.

"It's very strange, your Honour, but I never saw an Irishman or Scotchman yet that hadn't the vanity to think he spoke English better than we do."

"But the Yankees?" said I.

"Well, Sir, they are foreigners, you know, and only speak broken English; but they mix up a deal of words of their own with it, and then wonder you don't understand them. They keep their mouths so busy chawing, they have to talk through their noses.

"A few days after that, Sir, we walked down to the marketplace, and there was another of these hanimals for sale. But perhaps I am making too bold, Sir?"

"No, no, not at all; go on. I like to hear you."

"'Well,' said M'Clure to the countryman, 'What do you call that?'

"'A moose,' said he.

"Well, I gives him a nudge of my helbow, to remind him not to tell him it was a 'daumed lee,' as he did the other man.

"'What does moose mean, my man?'

"Would you believe it, Sir, he didn't like that word 'my man,' partikelarly coming from a soldier, for they are so hignorant here they affect to look down upon soldiers, and call 'em 'thirteen pences.'

"'Mean,' said he, 'it means that,' a-pointin' to the carcass. 'Do you want to buy it?'

"'Hem!' said Mac. 'Well now, my good fellow—'

"Oh, Sir, if you had a seen the countryman when he heard them words, it would a been as good as a play. He eyed him all over, very scornful, as if he was taking his measure and weight for throwing him over the sled by his cape and his trousers, and then he put his hand in his waistcoat pocket, and took out a large black fig of coarse tobacco, and bit a piece out of it, as if it was an apple, and fell too a chewing of it, as if to vent his wrath on it, but said nothing.

"'Well, my good fellow,' said Mac, 'when there are more than one, or they are in the plural number, what do you call them?'

"'Mice,' said the fellow.

"'Mice!' said M'Clure, 'I must look into that; it's very odd. Still, it can't be mooses either.'

"He didn't know what to make of it; he had been puzzled with mouse before, and found he was wrong, so he thought it was possible 'mice' might be the right word after all.

"'Well,' said he, 'what do you call the female moose?'

"'Why,' sais the man, 'I guess,' a-talkin' through his nose instead of his mouth—how I hate that Yankee way, don't you, Sir? 'Why,' sais he, 'I guess we call the he-moose M, and the other N, as the case may be.'

"'Who gave them that name?' said M'Clure.

"'Why, I reckon,' said the other, 'their godfathers and godmothers at their baptism, but I can't say, for I warn't there.'

"'I say, my man,' said M'Clure, 'you had better keep a civil tongue in your head.'

"'Ask me no questions, then,' said the countryman, 'and I'll tell you no lies; but if you think to run a rig on me, you have made a mistake in the child, and barked up the wrong tree, that's all. P'raps I ain't so old as you be, but I warn't born yesterday. So slope, if you please, for I want to sneeze, and if I do, it will blow your cap over the market-house, and you'll be lucky if your head don't go along with it."

"'Come away,' said I, 'Mac, that fellow has no more manners than a heathen.'

"'He's an hignorant beast,' said he, 'he is beneath notice.'

"The man eard that, and called after him, 'Hofficer, hofficer,' said he.

"That made M'Clure stop, for he was expectin' to be one every day, and the word sounded good, and Scotchmen, Sir, ain't like other people, pride is as natural as oatmeal to them. The man came up to us limpin'.

"'Hofficer,' said he, 'I ax your pardon if I offended you, I thought you was a pokin' fun at me, for I am nothing but a poor hignorant farmer, from the country, and these townspeople are always making game of us. I'll tell you all about that are moose and how I killed him. He urt my feelins, Sir, or I never would have mislested him, for Zack Wilcox is as good-natured a chap, it's generally allowed, as ever lived. Yes, he trod on my toes, I don't feel right yet, and when any fellow does that to me, why there ain't no mistake about it, his time is out and the sentence is come to pass. He begged for his life, oh, it was piteous to see him. I don't mean to say the dumb beast spoke, but his looks were so beseeching just the way if you was tied up to the halbert to be whipped, you'd look at the general.'

"'Me?' said M'Clure.

"'Yes, you or anybody else,' said the man. 'Well,' said he, 'I told him I wouldn't shoot him, I'de give him one chance for his life, but if he escaped he'd be deaf for ever afterwards. Poor feller, I didn't intend to come it quite so strong, but he couldn't stand the shock I gave him, and it killed him—frightened him to death.'

"'How?' said M'Clure.

"'Why,' sais he, 'I'll tell you,' and he looked cautiously all round, as if he didn't want any one to know the secret. 'I gave him a most an almighty hambler that fairly keeled him over.'

"'What?' said M'Clure.

"'Why,' sais he, 'I gave him,' and he bent forward towards his hear as if to whisper the word, 'I gave him a most thunderin' everlastin' loud—' and he gave a yell into his hear that was eard clean across the harbour, and at the ospital beyond the dockyard, and t'other way as far as Fresh-water Bridge. Nothin' was hever eard like it before.

"M'Clure sprang backwards the matter of four or five feet, and placed his hand on his side arms, while the countryman brayed out a horse laugh that nearly took away one's earing. The truck-men gate him a cheer, for they are all Irishmen, and they don't like soldiers commonly on account of their making them keep the peace at ome at their meetin' of monsters, and there was a general commotion in the market. We beat a retreat, and when we got out of the crowd, sais I, 'M'Clure, that comes of arguing with every one you meet. It's a bad habit.'

"'I wasn't arguing,' sais he, quite short, 'I was only asking questions, and how can you ever learn if you don't inquire?'

"Well, when he got to the barrack, he got a book wrote by a Frenchman, called Buffoon."

"A capital name," sais I, "for a Frenchman," but he didn't take, for there is no more fun in an Englishman than a dough pudding, and went on without stopping.

"Sais he, 'this author is all wrong. He calls it han 'horiginal,' but he ain't a native animal, it's half English and half Yankee. Some British cattle at a remote period have been wrecked here, strayed into the woods, and erded with the Carriboo. It has the ugly carcass and ide of the ox, and has taken the orns, short tail, and its speed from the deer. That accounts for its being larger than the native stags.' I think he was right, Sir, what is your opinion?"

The doctor and the rest of the party coming up just put an end to Jackson's dissertation on the origin of the moose. The former said,

"Come, Mr Slick, suppose we try the experiment of the bow," and Jessie, seeing us preparing for shooting, asked the doctor for smaller ones for her sister and herself. The targets were accordingly prepared, and placing myself near one of them, I discharged the gun and removed a few paces on one side, and commenced as rapidly as I could to reload, but the doctor had sent three arrows through mine before I had finished. It required almost as little time as a revolver. He repeated the trial again with the same result.

"What do you think of the bow now?" said he in triumph. "Come, Captain, do you and Mr Slick try your luck, and see what sort of shots you can make." The captain, who was an experienced hand with the gun, after a few attempts to ascertain the power and practice necessary, made capital play with the bow, and his muscular arm rendered easy to him that which required of me the utmost exertion of my strength. Jessie and her sister now stept forward, and measuring off a shorter distance, took their stations. Their shooting, in which they were quite at home, was truly wonderful. Instead of using the bow as we did, so as to bring the arrow in a line with the eye, they held it lower down, in a way to return the elbow to the right side, much in the same manner that a skilful sportsman shoots from the hip. It seemed to be no sort of exertion whatever to them, and every arrow was lodged in the inner circle. It seemed to awaken them to a new existence, and in their excitement I observed they used their mother tongue.

"Beg your pardon, Sir," said Jackson to the doctor, putting his hand to his forehead, "if our sharp-shooters in Spain ad ad bows like yours, in their scrimmages with the French light troops, they would ave done more service and made less noise about it than they did." And saluting me in the same manner, he said in an under-tone,

"If I ad ad one of them at Badajoz, Sir, I think I'd a put a pen in that trooper's mouth to write the account of the way he lost his elmet. A shower of them, Sir, among a troop of cavalry would have sent riders flying, and horses kicking, as bad as a shower of grape. There is no danger of shooting your fingers off with them, Sir, or firing away your ramrod. No, there ain't, is there, Sir?"

"Tom, do'ee put on your hat now, that's a good soul," said his attentive wife, who had followed him out a third time to remind him of his danger. "Oh, Sir," said she, again addressing me, "what signifies a armless thing like an harrow; that's nothin but a little wooden rod to the stroke of the sun, as they calls it. See what a dreadful cut it's given him."

Tom looked very impatient at this, but curbed in his vexation, and said "Thankee, Betty," though his face expressed anything but thanks. "Thankee, Betty. There, the doctor is calling you. She is as good a creature, Sir, as ever lived," he continued; "and has seen a deal of service in her day. But she bothers me to death about that stroke of the sun. Sometimes I think I'll tell her all about it; but I don't like to demean myself to her. She wouldn't think nothin' of me, Sir, if she thought I could have been floored that way; and women, when they begin to cry, throw up sometime what's disagreeable. They ain't safe. She would perhaps have heaved up in my face that that dragoon had slapped my chops for me, with his elmet. I am blowed, Sir, if I can take a glass of grog out of my canteen, but she says, 'Tom, mind that stroke of the sun.' And when I ave a big D marked agin my name in the pension book, she'll swear, to her dying day, I was killed by that are stroke."

"Why don't you put it on then," I said, "just to please her."

"Well, Sir, if I was at head-quarters, or even at han hout-post, where there was a detachment, I would put it hon; because it wouldn't seem decent to go bare-headed. But Lord bless you, Sir, what's the use of a hat in the woods, where there is no one to see you?"

Poor fellow, he didn't know what a touch of human nature there was in that expression, "what's the use of a hat in the woods, where there is no one to see you?"

The same idea, though differently expressed, occurs to so many. "Yes," said I to myself, "put on your hat for your wife's sake, and your own too; for though you may fail to get a stroke of the sun, you may get not an inflammation of the brain, for there ain't enough of it for that complaint to feed on, but rheumatism in the head; and that will cause a plaguey sight more pain than the dragoon's helmet ever did, by a long chalk."

But, to get back to my story, for the way I travel through a tale is like the way a child goes to school. He leaves the path to chase a butterfly, or to pick wild strawberries, or to run after his hat that has blown off, or to take a shy at a bird, or throw off his shoes, roll up his trousers, and wade about the edge of a pond to catch polly-wogs; but he gets to school in the eend, though somewhat of the latest, so I have got back at last, you see.

Mother used to say, "Sam, your head is always a woolgathering."

"I am glad of it," says I, "marm."

"Why, Sam," she'd say, "why, what on earth do you mean?"

"Because, marm," I'd reply, "a head that's alway a gathering will get well stored at last."

"Do get out," the dear old soul would say, "I do believe, in my heart, you are the most nimpent (impudent), idlest, good-for-nothingest boy in the world. Do get along."

But she was pleased, though, after all; for women do like to repeat little things like them, that their children say, and ask other people, who don't hear a word, or if they do, only go right off and laugh at 'em: "Ain't that proper 'cute now? Make a considerable smart man when he is out of his time, and finished his broughtens up, won't he?"

Well, arter the archery meeting was over, and the congregation disparsed, who should I find myself a walkin' down to the lake with but Jessie? How it was, I don't know, for I warn't a lookin' for her, nor she for me; but so it was. I suppose it is human natur, and that is the only way I can account for it. Where there is a flower, there is the bee; where the grass is sweet, there is the sheep; where the cherry is ripe, there is the bird; and where there is a gall, especially if she is pretty, there it is likely I am to be found also. Yes, it must be natur. Well, we walked, or rather, strolled off easy. There are different kinds of gaits, and they are curious to observe; for I consait sometimes I can read a man's character in his walk. The child trots; the boy scarcely touches the ground with his feet, and how the plague he wears his shoes out so fast I don't know. Perhaps Doctor Lardner can tell, but I'll be hanged if I can, for the little critter is so light, he don't even squash the grass. The sailor waddles like a duck, and gives his trousers a jerk to keep them from going down the masts (his legs) by the run; a sort of pull at the main-brace. The soldier steps solemn and formal, as if the dead march in Saul was a playin'. A man and his wife walk on different sides of the street; he sneaks along head down, and she struts head up, as if she never heard the old proverb, "Woe to the house where the hen crows." They leave the carriage-way between them, as if they were afraid their thoughts could be heard. When meetin' is out, a lover lags behind, as if he had nothin' above particular to do but to go home; and he is in no hurry to do that, for dinner won't be ready this hour. But, as soon as folks are dodged by a blue bonnet with pink ribbons ahead, he pulls foot like a lamplighter, and is up with the gall that wears it in no time, and she whips her arms in hisn, and they saunter off, to make the way as long as possible. She don't say, "Peeowerful sermon that, warn't it?" and he don't reply, "I heerd nothin' but the text, 'Love one another.'" Nor does he squeeze her arm with his elbow, nor she pinch his with her little blue-gloved fingers. Watch them after that, for they go so slow, they almost crawl, they have so much to say, and they want to make the best of their time; and besides, walking fast would put them out of breath.

The articled-clerk walks the streets with an air as much like a military man as he can; and it resembles it almost as much as electrotype ware does silver. He tries to look at ease, though it is a great deal of trouble; but he imitates him to a hair in some things, for he stares impudent at the galls, has a cigar in his mouth, dresses snobbishly, and talks of making a book at Ascot. The young lawyer struts along in his seven-league boots, has a white-bound book in one hand, and a parcel of papers, tied with red tape, in the other. He is in a desperate hurry, and as sure as the world, somebody is a dying, and has sent for him to make his will. The Irish priest walks like a warder who has the keys. There is an air of authority about him. He puts his cane down on the pavement hard, as much as to say, Do you hear that, you spalpeen? He has the secrets of all the parish in his keeping; but they are other folk's secrets, and not his own, and of course, so much lighter to carry, it don't prevent him looking like a jolly fellow, as he is, arter all. The high-churchman has an M. B. waistcoat on, is particular about his dress, and walks easy, like a gentleman, looks a little pale about the gills, like a student; but has the air of a man that wanted you to understand—I am about my work, and I would have you to know I am the boy to do it, and do it too without a fuss. If he meets a bishop, he takes his hat off, for he admits his authority. If a beggar accosts him, he slips some charity in his hands, and looks scared lest he should be seen.

The low-churchman hates the M. B. vestment, it was him who christened it. He is a dab at nick-names. He meant it to signify the Mark of the Beast. He likes the broad-brimmed beaver, it's more like a quaker, and less like a pope. It is primitive. He looks better fed than the other, and in better care. Preachin' he finds in a general way easier than practice. Watch his face as he goes along, slowly and solemncoly through the street. He looks so good, all the women that see him say, "Ain't he a dear man?" He is meekness itself. Butter wouldn't melt in his mouth. He has no pride in him. If there is any, it ain't in his heart at any rate. Perhaps there is a little grain in his legs, but it never got any higher. Sometimes, I suspect they have been touched with the frost, for the air of a dining-room is colder under the table than above it, and his legs do march stiff and formal like a soldier's, but then, as he says, he is of the church militant. See what a curious expression of countenance he has when he meets his bishop. Read it, it says: "Now, my old Don, let us understand each other; you may ordain and confirm, but don't you go one inch beyond that. No synods, no regeneration in baptism, no control for me; I won't stand it. My idea is every clergyman is a bishop in his own parish, and his synod is composed of pious galls that work, and rich spinsters that give. If you do interfere, I will do my duty and rebuke those in high places. Don't rile me, for I have an ugly pen, an ugly tongue, and an ugly temper, and nothing but my sanctity enables me to keep them under." If he is accosted by a beggar, he don't, like the other, give him money to squander, but he gives him instruction. He presents him with a tract. As he passes on, the poor wretch pauses and looks after him, and mutters—"Is it a prayer? most likely, for that tract must be worth something, for it cost something to print."

Then there is the sectarian lay-brother. He has a pious walk, looks well to his ways lest he should stumble, and casting his eyes down, kills two birds with one stone. He is in deep meditation about a contract for a load of deals, and at the same time regards his steps, for the ways of the world are slippery. His digestion is not good, and he eats pickles, for the vinegar shows in his face. Like Jehu Judd, he hates "fiddling and dancing, and serving the devil," and it is lucky he has a downcast look, for here come two girls that would shock him into an ague.

Both of them have the colonial step and air, both of them too are beautiful, as Nova Scotia girls generally are. The first is young and delicate, and as blooming as a little blush-rose. She holds out with each hand a portion of her silk dress, as if she was walking a minuet, and it discloses a snow-white petticoat, and such a dear little foot and ankle—lick! Her step is short and mincing. She has a new bonnet on, just imported by the last English steamer. It has a horrid name, it is called a kiss-me-quick. It is so far back on her head, she is afraid people will think she is bare-faced, so she casts her eyes down, as much as to say, "Don't look at me, please, I am so pretty I am afraid you will stare, and if you do I shall faint, as sure as the world, and if you want to look at my bonnet, do pray go behind me, for what there is of it is all there. It's a great trial to me to walk alone, when I am so pretty." So she compresses her sweet lips with such resolution, that her dear little mouth looks so small you'd think it couldn't take in a sugar-plum. Oh, dear, here are some officers approaching, for though she looks on the pavement she can see ahead for all that. What is to be done. She half turns aside, half is enough, to turn her back would be rude, and she looks up at a print or a necklace, or something or another in a shop window, and it's a beautiful attitude, and very becoming, and if they will stare, she is so intent on the show glass, she can't see them, and won't faint, and her little heart flutters as one of them says as he passes, "Devilish pretty gall, that, Grant, who is she?" and then she resumes her walk, and minces on.

If any man was to take his Bible oath that that little delicate girl, when she gets home, and the hall-door is shut, will scream out at the tip eend of her voice, like a screetching paraquet, "Eliza Euphemia, where in creation have you stowed yourself too?" and that Eliza Euphemia would hear her away up in the third story, and in the same key answer: "I can't come down, I ain't fit to be seen, nary way, for I'm all open before, and onfastened behind, and my hair is all in paper," I wouldn't believe him; would you?

The other young lady, that follows, is a little too much of Juno, and somewhat too little of Venus. She is a tall, splendid-looking heifer, as fine a gall as you will see in any country, and she takes it for granted you don't need to inquire who she is. She ain't bold, and she ain't diffident; but she can stare as well as you can, and has as good a right too. Her look is scorny, as the snobocracy pass and do homage, by bestowing on her an admiring look. Her step is firm, but elastic; it is a decided step, but the pious lay-brother regards her not, and moves not out of his way for her. So she stops that he may see his error, and when he does look, he perceives that it would lead him into further error if he gazed long, so he moves to the other side of the path, but does it so slowly, she confronts him again. After a moment's reflection, he tries to turn her flank—a movement that is unfortunately anticipated by her, and there is a collision on the track. The concussion dislocates his hat, and the red silk Bandannah handkerchief, which acted as travelling-bag, and pocket-book, discharges its miscellaneous contents on the pavement. That's onlucky; for he was a going to shunt off on another line and get away; but he has to stop and pick up the fragmentary freight of his beaver.

Before he can do this, he is asked by Juno how he dares to stop a lady in that indecent manner in the street; and while he is pleading not guilty to the indictment, the gentlemen that stared at the simpering beauty, come to the aid of the fair prosecutrix. She knows them, and they say, "Capital, by Jove—what a rum one he is!" Rum one; why he is a member of a temperance society, walks in procession when to home, with a white apron in front, and the ends of a scarf-like sash behind, and a rosette as large as a soup-plate on his breast—a rum one; what an infamous accusation!

The poor man stands aghast at this; he humbly begs pardon, and Juno is satisfied. She takes one of the beaux by the arm, and says: "Do pray see me home—I am quite nervous;" and to prove it she laughs as loud as any of them. The joke is now being carried too far, and the young sword-knots pick up, amid roars of laughter, his handkerchief, the papers, the horn-comb, the fig of tobacco, the fractured pipe, the jack-knife, and the clean shirt-collar, that was only worn once, and toss them into his hat, which is carefully secured on his head, so low as to cover his eyes, and so tight as nearly to shave off both his ears. The lay-brother thinks, with great truth, that he would sooner take five yoke of oxen, and tail a mast for a frigate through the solid forest to the river, than snake his way through the streets of a garrison-town. After re-adjusting his hat, he resumes his pious gait, and Juno also goes her way, and exhibits her decided step.

Now, the step of Jessie and myself was unlike any of these—it was a natural and easy one; the step of people who had no reason to hurry, and, at the same time, were not in the habit of crawling. In this manner we proceeded to the lake, and sought a point of land which commanded a full view of it on both sides, and embraced nearly its whole length. Here was a clump of trees from which the underwood had been wholly cut away, so as to form a shade for the cattle depasturing in the meadow. As we entered the grove, Jessie exclaimed:

"Oh! Mr Slick, do look! Here is a canoe—can you use a paddle?"

"As well as an oar," said I, "and perhaps a little grain better; for I haven't been down all the New Brunswick and Nova Scotia rivers in 'em for nothing, let alone Lake Michigan, George, Madawaska, and Rossignol, and I don't know how many others. Step in, and let us have at them on the water."

In a minute the canoe was launched, and away we flew like lightning. Oh, there is nothing like one of those light, elegant, graceful barks; what is a wherry or a whale-boat, or a skull or a gig, to them? They draw no more water than an egg-shell; they require no strength to paddle; they go right up on the beach, and you can carry them about like a basket. With a light hand, a cool head, and a quick eye, you can make them go where a duck can. What has science, and taste, and handicraft ever made to improve on this simple contrivance of the savage? When I was for two years in John Jacob Astor Fur Company's employment, I knew the play of Jessie's tribe.

"Can you catch," said I, "Miss?"

"Can you?"

"Never fear."

And we exchanged paddles, as she sat in one end of the canoe and I in the other, by throwing them diagonally at each other as if we were passing a shuttle-cock. She almost screamed with delight, and in her enthusiasm addressed me in her native Indian language.

"Gaelic," said I, "give me Gaelic, dear, for I am very simple and very innocent."

"Oh, very," she said, and as she dropped her paddle into the water, managed to give me the benefit of a spoonful in the eyes.

After we had tried several evolutions with the canoe, and had proceeded homeward a short distance, we opened a miniature bay into which we leisurely paddled, until we arrived at its head, where a small waterfall of about forty feet in height poured its tributary stream into the lake. On the right-hand side, which was nearest to the house, was a narrow strip of verdant intervale, dotted here and there with vast shady beeches and elms. I never saw a more lovely spot. Hills rose above each other beyond the waterfall, like buttresses to support the conical one that, though not in itself a mountain (for there is not, strictly speaking, one in this province), yet loomed as large in the light mist that enveloped its lofty peak. As this high cliff rose abruptly from the lake, the light of smaller cascades was discernible through the thin shrubbery that clothed its rocky side, although their voice was drowned in the roar of that at its base.

Nothing was said by either of us for some time, for both were occupied by different thoughts. I was charmed with its extraordinary beauty, and wondered how it was possible that it should be so little known as not even to have a name. My companion, on the other hand, was engaged in sad reflections, which the similarity of the scene with her early recollections of her home in the far west suggested to her mind.

"Ain't this beautiful, Jessie?" I said, "don't this remind you of Canada, or rather your own country?"

"Oh, yes," she said, "me—me," for during the whole day there had been a sad confusion of languages and idioms, "me very happy and very sad; I want to laugh, I want to cry; I am here and there," pointing to the north-west. "Laughing, talking, sporting with my father, and Jane, and you, and am also by the side of my dear mother, far—far beyond those hills. I see your people and my people; I paddle in our canoe, shoot with our bows, speak our language; yes, I am here, and there also. The sun too is in both places. He sees us all. When I die, perhaps I shall go back, but I am not of them or of you—I am nothing," and she burst into tears and wept bitterly.

"Jessie," said I, "let us talk about something else; you have been too much excited this morning, let us enjoy what God gives us, and not be ungrateful; let your sister come also, and try the canoe once more. This is better than a hot room, ain't it?"

"Oh yes," she replied, "this is life. This is freedom."

"Suppose we dine here," I said.

"Oh yes," she replied, "I should like it above all things. Let us dine on the grass, the table the great Spirit spreads for his children;" and the transient cloud passed away, and we sped back to the lawn as if the bark that carried us was a bird that bore us on its wings.

Poor Jessie, how well I understood her emotions. Home is a word, if there is one in the language, that appeals directly to the heart. Man and wife, father and mother, brothers and sisters, master and servant, with all their ties, associations, and duties, all, all are contained in that one word. Is it any wonder, when her imagination raised them up before her, that the woman became again a child, and that she longed for the wings of the dove to fly away to the tents of her tribe in the far west? I am myself as dry, as seasoned, and as hard as the wood of which my clocks are made. I am a citizen of the world rather than of Slickville. But I too felt my heart sink within me when I reflected that mine, also, was desolate, and that I was alone in my own house, the sole surviving tenant of all that large domestic circle, whose merry voices once made its silent halls vocal with responsive echoes of happiness. We know that our fixed domicile is not here, but we feel that it is and must continue to be our home, ever dear and ever sacred, until we depart hence for another and a better world. They know but little of the agency of human feelings, who in their preaching attempt to lessen our attachment for the paternal roof, because, in common with all other earthly possessions, it is perishable in its nature, and uncertain in it's tenure. The home of life is not the less estimable because it is not the home of eternity; but the more valuable perhaps as it prepares and fits us by its joys and its sorrows, its rights and its duties, and also by what it withholds, as well as imparts, for that inheritance which awaits us hereafter. Yes, home is a great word, but its full meaning ain't understood by every one.

It ain't those who have one, or those who have none, that comprehend what it is; nor those who in the course of nature leave the old and found a new one for themselves; nor those who, when they quit, shut their eyes and squinch their faces when they think of it, as if it fetched something to their mind that warn't pleasant to recollect; nor those who suddenly rise so high in life, that their parents look too vulgar, or the old cottage too mean for them, or their former acquaintances too low. But I'll tell you who knows the meaning and feels it too; a fellow like me, who had a cheerful home, a merry and a happy home, and who when he returns from foreign lands finds it deserted and as still as the grave, and all that he loved scattered and gone, some to the tomb, and others to distant parts of the earth. The solitude chills him, the silence appals him. At night shadows follow him like ghosts of the departed, and the walls echo back the sound of his footsteps, as if demons were laughing him to scorn. The least noise is heard over the whole house. The clock ticks so loud he has to remove it, for it affects his nerves. The stealthy mouse tries to annoy him with his mimic personification of the burglar, and the wind moans among the trees as if it lamented the general desolation. If he strolls out in his grounds, the squirrel ascends the highest tree and chatters and scolds at the unusual intrusion, while the birds fly away screaming with affright, as if pursued by a vulture. They used to be tame once, when the family inhabited the house, and listen with wonder at notes sweeter and more musical than their own. They would even feed from the hand that protected them. His dog alone seeks his society, and strives to assure him by mute but expressive gestures that he at least will never desert him. As he paces his lonely quarter-deck (as he calls the gravel-walk in front of his house), the silver light of the moon, gleaming here and there between the stems of the aged trees, startles him with the delusion of unreal white-robed forms, that flit about the shady groves as if enjoying or pitying his condition, or perhaps warning him that in a few short years he too must join this host of disembodied spirits.

Time hangs heavily on his hands, he is tired of reading, it is too early for repose, so he throws himself on the sofa and muses, but even meditation calls for a truce. His heart laments its solitude, and his tongue its silence. Nature is weary and exhausted, and sleep at last comes to his aid. But, alas! he awakes in the morning only to resume his dull monotonous course, and at last he fully comprehends what it is to be alone. Women won't come to see him, for fear they might be talked about, and those that would come would soon make him a subject of scandal. He and the world, like two people travelling in opposite directions, soon increase at a rapid rate the distance between them. He loses his interest in what is going on around him, and people lose their interest in him. If his name happens to be mentioned, it may occasion a listless remark, "I wonder how he spends his time?" or, "The poor devil must be lonely there."

Yes, yes, there are many folks in the world that talk of things they don't understand, and there are precious few who appreciate the meaning of that endearing term "home." He only knows it as I have said who has lived in one, amid a large family, of which he is the solitary surviving member. The change is like going from the house to the sepulchre, with this difference only, one holds a living and the other a dead body. Yes, if you have had a home you know what it is, but if you have lost it, then and not till then do you feel its value.



CHAPTER X. A DAY ON THE LAKE.—PART I.

When we reached the grove, I left Jessie in the canoe, and went up to the house in search of her sister. Jackson and Peter were sitting on the wood-pile; the latter was smoking his pipe, and the other held his in his hand, as he was relating some story of his exploits in Spain. When I approached, he rose up and saluted me in his usual formal manner.

"Where is the doctor," said I, "and the rest of the party?"

"Gone to see a tame moose of his, Sir," he said, "in the pasture; but they will be back directly."

"Well," sais I, lighting a cigar by Peter's pipe, and taking a seat alongside of him, "go on Jackson; don't let me interrupt you."

"I was just telling Mr McDonald, Sir," said he, "of a night I once spent on the field of battle in Spain."

"Well, go on."

"As I was a saying to him, Sir," he continued, "you could ear the wolves among the dead and the dying a owling like so many devils. I was afraid to go to sleep, as I didn't know when my turn might come; so I put my carbine across my knees, and sat up as well as I could, determined to sell my life as dearly as possible, but I was so weak from the loss of blood, that I kept dozing and starting all the time amost. Oh, what a tedious night that was, Sir, and how I longed for the dawn of day, when search should be made among us for the wounded! Just as the fog began to rise, I saw a henormous wolf, about a hundred yards or so from me, busy tearing a body to pieces; and taking a good steady haim at him, I fired, when he called out:

"'Blood and ounds! you cowardly furrin rascal, haven't you had your belly-full of fighting yet, that you must be after murthering a wounded man that way? By the powers of Moll Kelly, but you won't serve Pat Kallahan that dirty trick again anyhow.'

"As he levelled at me, I fell back, and the ball passed right over me and struck a wounded orse that was broke down behind, and a sittin' up on his fore-legs like a dog. Oh, the scream of that are hanimal, Sir, was just like a Christian's. It was hawful. I have the sound of it in my ears now halmost. It pierced through me, and you might have eard it that still morning over the whole field. He sprung up and then fell over, and kicked and struggled furious for a minute or two before he died, and every time he lashed out, you could a eard a elpless wounded wretch a groanin' bitterly, as he battered away at him. The truth is, Sir, what I took for a wolf that hazy morning, was poor Pat, who was sitting up, and trying to bandage his hankle, that was shattered by a bullet, and the way he bobbed his head up and down, as he stooped forward, looked exactly as a wolf does when he is tearing the flesh off a dead body.

"Well, the scream of that are orse, and the two shots the dragoon and I exchanged, saved my life, for I saw a man and a woman making right straight for us. It was Betty, Sir, God bless her, and Sergeant M'Clure. The owling she sot up, when she saw me, was dreadful to ear, Sir.

"'Betty,' said I, 'dear, for eaven's sake see if you can find a drop of brandy in any of these poor fellows' canteens, for I am perishing of thirst, and amost chilled to death.'

"'Oh, Tom, dear,' said she, 'I have thought of that,' and unslinging one from her shoulders put it to my lips, and I believe I would have drained it at a draft, but she snatched it away directly, and said:

"'Oh, do 'ee think of that dreadful stroke of the sun, Tom. It will set you crazy if you drink any more.'

"'The stroke of the sun be anged!' said I; 'it's not in my ead this time—it's in the other end of me.'

"'Oh dear, dear!' said Betty; 'two such marks as them, and you so handsome too! Oh dear, dear!'

"Poor old soul! it's a way she had of trying to come round me.

"'Where is it?' said M'Clure.

"'In the calf of my leg,' said I.

"Well, he was a handy man, for he had been a hospital-sargeant, on account of being able to read doctors' pot-hooks and inscriptions. So he cut my boot, and stript down my stocking and looked at it. Says he, 'I must make a turn-and-quit.'

"'Oh, Rory,' said I, 'don't turn and quit your old comrade that way.'

"'Oh, Rory, dear,' said Betty, 'don't 'ee leave Tom now—don't 'ee, that's a good soul.'

"'Pooh!' said he, 'nonsense! How your early training has been neglected, Jackson!'

"'Rory,' said I, 'if I was well you wouldn't dare to pass that slur upon me. I am as well-trained a soldier and as brave a man as ever you was.'

"'Tut, tut, man,' said he, 'I meant your learning.'

"'Well,' says I, 'I can't brag much of that, and I am not sorry for it. Many a better scholar nor you, and better-looking man too, has been anged afore now, for all his schoolin'.'

"Says he, 'I'll soon set you up, Tom. Let me see if I can find anything here that will do for a turn-and-quit.'

"Close to where I lay there, was a furrin officer who had his head nearly amputated with a sabre cut. Well, he took a beautiful gold repeater out of his fob, and a great roll of dubloons out of one pocket, and a little case of diamond rings out of the other.

"'The thieving Italian rascal?' said he, 'he has robbed a jeweller's shop before he left the town,' and he gave the body a kick and passed on. Well, close to him was an English officer.

"'Ah,' said he, 'here is something useful,' and he undid his sash, and then feeling in his breast pocket, he hauled out a tin tobacco-case, and opening of it, says he:

"'Tom, here's a real god-send for you. This and the sash I will give you as a keepsake. They are mine by the fortune of war, but I will bestow them on you.'"

"Oigh! oigh!" said Peter, "she was no shentleman."

"He warn't then, Sir," said Tom, not understanding him, "for he was only a sargeant like me at that time, but he is now, for he is an officer."

"No, no," said Peter, "the king can make an offisher, but she can't make a shentleman. She took the oyster hern ainsel, and gave you the shell."

"Well," continued Jackson, "he took the sash, and tied it round my leg, and then took a bayonet off a corpse, and with that twisted it round and round so tight it urt more nor the wound, and then he secured the bayonet so that it wouldn't slip. There was a furrin trooper's orse not far off that had lost his rider, and had got his rein hunder his foreleg, so Betty caught him and brought him to where I was a sitting. By the haid of another pull at the canteen, which put new life into me, and by their hassistance, I was got on the saddle, and he and Betty steadied me on the hanimal, and led me off. I no sooner got on the orse than Betty fell to a crying and a scolding again like anything.

"'What hails you now,' says I, 'Betty? You are like your own town of Plymouth—it's showery weather with you all the year round amost. What's the matter now?'

"'Oh, Tom, Tom,' said she, 'you will break my eart yet—I know you will.'

"'Why what have I done?' says I. 'I couldn't help getting that little scratch on the leg.'

"'Oh, it tante that,' she said; 'it's that orrid stroke of the sun. There's your poor ead huncovered again. Where is your elmet?'

"'Oh, bother,' sais I, 'ow do I know? Somewhere on the ground, I suppose.'

"Well, back she ran as ard as she could, but M'Clure wouldn't wait a moment for her and went on, and as she couldn't find mine, she undid the furriner's and brought that, and to pacify her I had to put it on and wear it. It was a good day for M'Clure, and I was glad of it, for he was a great scholar and the best friend I ever had. He sold the orse for twenty pounds afterwards."

"She don't want to say nothin' disrespectable," said Peter, "against her friend, but she was no shentleman for all tat."

"He is now," said Tom again, with an air of triumph. "He is an hofficer, and dines at the mess. I don't suppose he'd be seen with me now, for it's agen the rules of the service, but he is the best friend I have in the world."

"She don't know nothin' about ta mess herself," said Peter, "but she supposes she eats meat and drinks wine every tay, which was more tan she did as a poy. But she'd rather live on oatmeal and drink whiskey, and be a poor shentlemen, than be an officher like M'Clure, and tine with the Queen, Cot bless her."

"And the old pipe, then, was all you got for your share, was it?" says I.

"No, Sir," said Tom, "it warn't. One day, when I was nearly well, Betty came to me—

"'Oh, Tom,' said she, 'I have such good news for you.'

"'What is it?' sais I, 'are we going to have another general engagement?'

"'Oh, dear, I hope not,' she said. 'You have had enough of fighting for one while, and you are always so misfortunate.'

"'Well, what is it?' sais I.

"'Will you promise me not to tell?'

"'Yes,' said I, 'I will.'

"'That's just what you said the first time I kissed you. Do get out,' she replied, 'and you promise not to lisp a word of it to Rory M'Clure? or he'll claim it, as he did that orse, and, Tom, I caught that orse, and he was mine. It was a orrid, nasty, dirty, mean trick that.'

"'Betty,' said I, 'I won't ear a word hagin him: he is the best friend I ever had, but I won't tell him, if you wish it.'

"'Well,' said Betty, and she bust out crying for joy, for she can cry at nothing, amost. 'Look, Tom, here's twenty Napoleons, I found them quilted in that officer's elmet.' So after all, I got out of that scrape pretty well, didn't I, Sir?"

"Indeed she did," said Peter, "but if she had seen as much of wolves as Peter McDonald has she wouldn't have been much frightened by them. This is the way to scare a whole pack of them;" and stooping down and opening a sack, he took out the bagpipes, and struck up a favourite Highland air. If it was calculated to alarm the animals of the forest, it at all events served now to recall the party, who soon made their appearance from the moose-yard. "Tat," said Peter, "will make 'em scamper like the tevil. It has saved her life several times."

"So I should think," said I. (For of all the awful instruments that ever was heard that is the worst. Pigs in a bag ain't the smallest part of a circumstance to it, for the way it squeals is a caution to cats.) When the devil was a carpenter, he cut his foot so bad with an adze, he threw it down, and gave up the trade in disgust. And now that Highlanders have given up the trade of barbarism, and become the noblest fellows in Europe, they should follow the devil's example, and throw away the bagpipes for ever.

"I have never seen M'Clure," said Jackson, addressing me, "but once since he disputed with the countryman about the plural of moose in the country-market. I met him in the street one day, and says I,

"'How are you, Rory? Suppose we take a bit of a walk.'

"Well, he held up his ead stiff and straight, and didn't speak for a minute or two; at last he said:

"'How do you do, Sargeant Jackson?'

"'Why, Rory,' sais I, 'what hails you to hact that way? What's the matter with you now, to treat an old comrade in that manner?'

"He stared ard at me in the face hagain, without giving any explanation. At last he said, 'Sargeant Jackson,' and then he stopped again. 'If anybody speers at you where Ensign Roderich M'Clure is to be found, say on the second flat of the officers' quarters at the North Barracks,' and he walked on and left me. He had got his commission."

"She had a Highland name," said Peter, "and tat is all, but she was only a lowland Glaskow peast. Ta teivil tack a' such friends a tat."

"Doctor," said I, "Jessie and I have discovered the canoe, and had a glorious row of it. I see you have a new skiff there; suppose we all finish the morning on the lake. We have been up to the waterfall, and if it is agreeable to you, Jessie proposes to dine at the intervale instead of the house."

"Just the thing," said the doctor, "but you understand these matters better than I do, so just give what instructions you think proper."

Jackson and Betty were accordingly directed to pack up what was needful, and hold themselves in readiness to be embarked on our return from the excursion on the water. Jessie, her sister, and myself took the canoe; the doctor and Cutler the boat, and Peter was placed at the stern to awaken the sleeping echoes of the lake with his pipes. The doctor seeing me provided with a short gun, ran hastily back to the house for his bow and arrows, and thus equipped and grouped, we proceeded up the lake, the canoe taking the lead. Peter struck up a tune on his pipes. The great expanse of water, and the large open area where they were played, as well as the novelty of the scene, almost made me think that it was not such bad music after all as I had considered it.

After we had proceeded a short distance, Jessie proposed a race between the canoe and the boat. I tried to dissuade her from it, on account of the fatigue she had already undergone, and the excitement she had manifested at the waterfall, but she declared herself perfectly well, and able for the contest. The odds were against the girls; for the captain and the doctor were both experienced hands, and powerful, athletic man, and their boat was a flat-bottomed skiff, and drew but little water. Added to which, the young women had been long out of practice, and their hands and muscles were unprepared by exercise. I yielded at last, on condition that the race should terminate at a large rock that rose out of the lake at about a mile from us. I named this distance, not merely because I wished to limit the extent of their exertion, but because I knew that if they had the lead that far, they would be unable to sustain it beyond that, and that they would be beaten by the main strength of the rowers. We accordingly slackened our speed till the boat came up alongside of us. The challenge was given and accepted, and the terminus pointed out, and when the signal was made, away we went with great speed.

For more than two-thirds of the distance we were bow and bow, sometimes one and sometimes the other being ahead, but on no occasion did the distance exceed a yard or so. When we had but the remaining third to accomplish, I cautioned the girls that the rowers would now probably put out all their strength, and take them by surprise, and therefore advised them to be on their guard. They said a few words to each other in their native language, laughed, and at once prepared for the crisis, by readjusting their seats and foothold, and then the eldest said, with a look of animation, that made her surpassingly beautiful, "Now," and away we went like iled lightning, leaving the boat behind at a rate that was perfectly incredible.

They had evidently been playing with them at first, and doing no more than to ascertain their speed and power of propulsion, and had all along intended to reserve themselves for this triumph at the last. As soon as we reached the winning point, I rose up to give the cheer of victory, but just at that moment, they suddenly backed water with their paddles, and in turning towards the boat, the toe of my boot caught in one of the light ribs of the canoe, which had been loosened by the heat of the sun, and I instantly saw that a fall was unavoidable. To put a hand on the side of the little bark would inevitably overset it, and precipitate the girls into the lake. I had but one resource left therefore, and that was to arch over the gunwale, and lift my feet clear of it, while I dove into the water. It was the work of an instant, and in another I had again reached the canoe. Begging Jessie to move forward, so as to counterbalance my weight, I rose over the stern (if a craft can be said to have one, where both ends are alike, and it can be propelled either way), and then took the seat that had been occupied by her.

"Now, Jane," said I, "I must return to the house, and get a dry suit of the doctor's clothes; let us see what we can do."

The doctor told me Betty knew more about his wardrobe than he did himself, and would furnish me with what I required; and in the mean time, that they would lay upon their oars till we returned.

"Are you ready, Miss," said I, "I want you to do your prettiest now, and put your best foot out, because I wish them to see that I am not the awkward critter in a canoe they think I am."

The fact is, Squire, that neither the doctor nor Cutler knew, that to avoid falling under the circumstances I was placed in, and to escape without capsizing the canoe, was a feat that no man, but one familiar with the management of those fragile barks, and a good swimmer, too, can perform. Peter was aware of it, and appreciated it; but the other two seemed disposed to cut their jokes upon me; and them that do that, generally find, in the long run, I am upsides with them, that's a fact. A cat and a Yankee always come on their feet, pitch them up in the air as high and as often as you please.

"Now for it," said I, and away we went at a 2.30 pace, as we say of our trotting horses. Cutler and the doctor cheered us as we went; and Peter, as the latter told me afterwards, said: "A man who can dwell like an otter, on both land and sea, has two lives." I indorse that saw, he made it himself; it's genuine, and it was like a trapper's maxim. Warn't it?

As soon as I landed I cut off for the house, and in no time rigged up in a dry suit of our host's, and joined the party, afore they knew where they were. I put on a face as like the doctor's as two clocks of mine are to each other. I didn't do it to make fun of him, but out of him. Oh, they roared again, and the doctor joined in it as heartily as any of them, though he didn't understand the joke. But Peter didn't seem to like it. He had lived so much among the Indians, and was so accustomed to their way of biling things down to an essence, that he spoke in proverbs, or wise saws. Says he to me, with a shake of his head, "a mocking bird has no voice of its own." It warn't a bad sayin', was it? I wish I had noted more of them, for though I like 'em, I am so yarney, I can't make them as pithey as he did. I can't talk short-hand, and I must say I like condensation. Now, brevity is the only use to individuals there is in telegraphs. There is very little good news in the world for any of us; and bad news comes fast enough. I hate them myself. The only good there is in 'em, is to make people write short; for if you have to pay for every word you use, you won't be extravagant in 'em, there is no mistake.

Telegraphs ruin intellect; they reduce a wise man to the level of a fool; and fifty years hence there won't be a sensible trader left. For national purposes they are very well, and government ought to have kept them to themselves, for those objects; but they play the devil with merchants. There is no room for the exercise of judgment. It's a dead certainty now. Flour is eight dollars in England; well, every one knows that, and the price varies, and every one knows that also, by telegraph. Before that, a judgmatical trader took his cigar in his mouth, sat down, and calculated. Crops short, Russian war, blockade, and so on. Capital will run up prices, till news of new harvest are known; and then they will come down by the run. He deliberates, reasons, and decides. Now, the last Liverpool paper gives the price current. It advises all, and governs all. Any blockhead can be a merchant now. Formerly, they poked sapey-headed goneys into Parliament, to play dummey; or into the army and navy, the church, and the colonial office. But they kept clever fellows for law, special commissioners, the stage, the "Times," the "Chronicle," and such like able papers, and commerce; and men of middlin' talents were resarved for doctors, solicitors, Gretna Green, and so on.

But the misfortinate prince-merchants now will have to go to the bottom of the list with tradesmen and retailers. They can't have an opinion of their own, the telegraph will give it. The latest quotations, as they call them, come to them, they know that iron is firm, and timber giving way, that lead is dull and heavy, and coal gone to blases, while the stocks are rising and vessels sinking, all the rest they won't trouble their heads about. The man who trades with Cuba, won't care about Sinope, and it's too much trouble to look for it on the map. While the Black Sea man won't care about Toronto, or whether it is in Nova Scotia or Vermont, in Canada or California. There won't soon be a merchant that understands geography.

But what is wuss, half the time the news is false, and if it hadn't been for that, old Hemp and Iron would have made a fortune. And if it is true, it's worse still, for he would have acted on his own judgment if he hadn't heard it, and circumstances would have altered as they always are doing every day, and he would have made a rael hit. Oh, I hate them. And besides this, they have spoiled them by swearing the operators. An oath gives them fellows such an itch to blart, that though they don't inform, they let the cat out of the bag, and that is as bad. Tell you what, I wouldn't like to confess by telegraph. If I am courting a gall and she sais all right, why then my fun is spoiled, for when a thing is settled, all excitement is gone, and if I am refused, the longer I am in ignorance the better. It is wiser to wait, as the Frenchman did at Clare, who sat up three nights to see how the letters passed over the wires. Well, if I am married, I have to report progress, and logbooks are always made up before or afterwards. It's apt to injure my veracity. In short, you know what I mean, and I needn't follow it out, for a nod is as good as a wink to a blind horse.

But the Lord have mercy on merchants, any fool will get along as well as the best of them now. Dear me, I recollect a man they poked fun at once at Salem. They induced him by way of a rise, to ship a cargo of blankets and warming-pans to the West Indies. Well, he did so, and made a good speck, for the pans were bought for dippers, and the blankets for strainers. Yes, telegraphs will reduce merchants to the level of that fellow Isaac Oxter.

But I must look for the trail again, or I shall forget my story.

I think I left off where I got back in the canoe, and joined the party in the boat. Well, we then proceeded like the off and near ox, pulling from rather than to each other, but still keeping neck and neck as it were. In this manner we proceeded to the head of the lake, and then as we returned steered for a small wooded island in the centre, where I proposed to land and rest awhile, for this beautiful sheet of water was of considerable extent. As we approached it, Peter again struck up his pipes, and shortly afterwards a noble male moose, as much terrified by the noise as McDonald said Canada wolves were, broke cover, and swam for the main land. The moose frequently select such places to secure their young from the bears, who are their greatest enemies, and find an easy prey in their helpless calves. It is not improbable that the female still remained, and that this act of gallantry in the buck was intended to withdraw attention from her, and thus save her from pursuit. I had no bullets with me, and my gun was only loaded with duck-shot. To discharge that at him, would have been a wanton act of cruelty, as at most it could only inflict upon him painful wounds. In this emergency, Jessie pointed to a stout half-inch rope that was coiled up in the bottom of the canoe, and I immediately exchanged places with her, and commenced making a lasso, while she plied the paddle.

We gained rapidly upon him, and I was preparing to throw the fatal noose over his horns, when to my astonishment he raised his neck and a portion of his fore-legs out of the water, as if he was landing. We were then a considerable distance from the shore, but it appeared, as I afterwards learned from the doctor, that a long low neck of land made out there into the lake, that was only submerged in the spring and autumn, but in summer was covered with wild grass, upon which deer fed with avidity, as an agreeable change from browsing. The instinct of the animal induced him to make for this shallow, from which he could bound away at full speed (trot) into the cover.

All hope of the chase was now over, and I was about abandoning it in despair, when an arrow whizzed by us, and in an instant he sprang to his feet, and exposed his huge form to view. He was a remarkable fine specimen of his kind, for they are the largest as well as the ugliest of the deer tribe. For an instant he paused, shook himself violently, and holding down his head, put up his fore-leg to break off that, which evidently maddened him with pain. He then stood up erect, with his head high in the air, and laid his horns back on his neck, and, giving a snort of terror, prepared to save his life by flight.

It is astonishing how much animation and attitude has to do with beauty. I had never seen one look well before, but as his form was relieved against the sky, he looked as he is, the giant king of the forest. He was just in the act of shifting his feet in the yielding surface of the boggy meadow, preparatory to a start, when he was again transfixed by an arrow, in a more vulnerable and vital part. He sprung, or rather reared forward, and came down on his knees, and then several times repeated the attempt to commence his flight by the same desperate effort. At last he fell to rise no more, and soon rolled over, and after some splashing with his head to avoid the impending death by drowning, quietly submitted to his fate. Nothing now was visible of him but the tips of his horns, and a small strip of the hide that covered his ribs. A shout from the boat proclaimed the victory.

"Ah, Mr Slick," said the doctor, "what could you have done with only a charge of duck-shot in your gun, eh? The arrow, you see, served for shot and bullet. I could have killed him with the first shaft, but his head was turned, and covered the vital spot. So I had to aim a little too far forward, but still it carried a death-warrant with it, for he couldn't have run over a mile without falling from exhaustion, arising from the loss of blood. It is a charming day for the bow, for there is no wind, and I could hit a dollar at a hundred and twenty yards. There is another on that island, but she probably has a calf, perhaps two, and it would be a wicked waste of the food that God provides for us, to destroy her. But we must get this gentleman into the boat, and it will bring us down so deep in the water, we must keep near the shore, as it may be necessary occasionally to wade."

Peter, without ceremony, began to make preparations for such an emergency. He had been accustomed all his life, until he left the Nor-west Company's employment, to the kilt, and he neither felt nor looked at home in the trousers. Like most of his countrymen, he thought there was more beauty in a hairy leg, and in a manly shammy-leather looking skin, than in any covering. While his bald knee, the ugliest, weakest, most complicated and important joint in the frame, he no doubt regarded with as much veneration as the pious do the shaven crown of a monk. He therefore very complacently and coolly began to disencumber himself of this detestable article of the tailor's skill. I thought it best therefore to push off in time, to spare his daughters this spectacle, merely telling the doctor we would wait for him where we had embarked.

We proceeded very leisurely, only once in a while dipping the paddle gently into the water, so as to keep up the motion of the canoe. The girls amused themselves by imitating the call and answer of the loon, the blue-jay, the kingfisher, and the owl. With a piece of bark, rolled up in the form of a short-ear trumpet, they mimicked the hideous voice of the moose, and the not less disagreeable lowing of the cariboo. The martin started in surprise at his affrighted neighbour on the water, and the fox no doubt crept from his hole to listen to the voice that called him to plunder, at this dangerous hour. All these sounds are signals among the Indians, and are carried to a perfection that deceives the ear of nature itself. I had read of their great power in this species of ventriloquism, but never had heard it practised before, with the exception of the imitation of the deer tribe, which is well-known to white "still-hunters."

They are, in their own country, not very communicative to strangers; and above all, never disclose practices so peculiarly reserved for their own service or defence. I was amazed at their skill in this branch of Indian accomplishment.

But the notes of the dear little chick-a-dee-dee charmed me the most. The stillness of this wild, sequestered place was most agreeably diversified by all these fictitious birds and beasts, that seemed inviting, each his own kind, to come and look at this lovely scene. From the wonderful control they appeared to have over their voices, I knew that one or both of them must sing. I therefore asked them if they knew the Canadian-boat song; and they answered, with great delight, that they did. And suiting the action to the word, which, by the by, adds marvellously to its effect, they sung it charmingly. I couldn't resist their entreaties to join in it, although I would infinitely have preferred listening to taking a part. When we concluded it, Jessie said it was much prettier in her native tongue, and sung a verse in her own language. She said the governor of the fort, who spoke Indian as well as English, had arranged the words for it, and when she was a child in his family, she learned it. "Listen," said she, "what is that?"

It was Jackson playing on the key-bugle. Oh, how gloriously it sounded, as its notes fell on the ear, mellowed and softened by the distance. When Englishmen talk of the hunters' horn in the morning, they don't know what they are a saying of. It's well enough I do suppose in the field, as it wakes the drowsy sportsman, and reminds him that there is a hard day's ride before him. But the lake and the forest is nature's amphitheatre, and it is at home there. It won't speak as it can do at all times and in all places; but it gives its whole soul out in the woods; and the echoes love it, and the mountains wave their plumes of pines to it, as if they wanted to be wooed by its clear, sweet, powerful notes.1 All nature listens to it, and keeps silence, while it lifts its voice on high. The breeze wafts its music on its wings, as if proud of its trust; and the lake lies still, and pants like a thing of life, as if its heart beat to its tones. The birds are all hushed, as if afraid to disturb it; and the deer pause, and listen, and gaze on the skies, as if the music came from heaven. Money only can move some men, and a white heat alone dissolve stones. But he who has ever heard the bugle, and is not inspired by it, has no divinity within him. The body is there, but the soul is wanting.