Rolf in the Woods. Ernest Thompson Seton

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      And when that ceased a barred owl hooted in the woods, away to the north.

      “Ugh! good,” was all he said as he rejoined Rolf; and they set out, as the sun went down, on their long journey due northward, Quonab, Rolf, and Skookum. They had not gone a hundred yards before the dog turned back, raced to a place where he had a bone in cache and rejoining there trotted along with his bone.

      The high road would have been the easier travelling, but it was very necessary to be unobserved, so they took the trail up the brook Asamuk, and after an hour's tramp came out by the Cat-Rock road that runs westerly. Again they were tempted by the easy path, but again Quonab decided on keeping to the woods. Half an hour later they were halted by Skookum treeing a coon. After they had secured the dog, they tramped on through the woods for two hours more, and then, some eight miles from the Pipestave, they halted, Rolf, at least, tired out. It was now midnight. They made a hasty double bed of the canvas cover over a pole above them, and slept till morning, cheered, as they closed their drowsy eyes, by the “Hoo, Hoo, Hoo, Hoo, yah, hoo,” of their friend, the barred owl, still to the northward.

      The sun was high, and Quonab had breakfast ready before Rolf awoke. He was so stiff with the tramp and the heavy pack that it was with secret joy he learned that they were to rest, concealed in the woods, that day, and travel only by night, until in a different region, where none knew or were likely to stop them. They were now in York State, but that did not by any means imply that they were beyond pursuit.

      As the sun rose high, Rolf went forth with his bow and blunt arrows, and then, thanks largely to Skookum, he succeeded in knocking over a couple of squirrels, which, skinned and roasted, made their dinner that day. At night they set out as before, making about ten miles. The third night they did better, and the next day being Sunday, they kept out of sight. But Monday morning, bright and clear, although it was the first morning when they were sure of being missed, they started to tramp openly along the highway, with a sense of elation that they had not hitherto known on the joumey. Two things impressed Rolf by their novelty: the curious stare of the country folk whose houses and teams they passed, and the violent antagonism of the dogs. Usually the latter could be quelled by shaking a stick at them, or by pretending to pick up a stone, but one huge and savage brindled mastiff kept following and barking just out of stick range, and managed to give Skookum a mauling, until Quonab drew his bow and let fly a blunt arrow that took the brute on the end of the nose, and sent him howling homeward, while Skookum got a few highly satisfactory nips at the enemy's rear. Twenty miles they made that day and twenty-five the next, for now they were on good roads, and their packs were lighter. More than once they found kind farmer folk who gave them a meal. But many times Skookum made trouble for them. The farmers did not like the way he behaved among their hens. Skookum never could be made to grasp the fine zoological distinction between partridges which are large birds and fair game, and hens which are large birds, but not fair game. Such hair splitting was obviously unworthy of study, much less of acceptance.

      Soon it was clearly better for Rolf, approaching a house, to go alone, while Quonab held Skookum. The dogs seemed less excited by Rolf's smell, and remembering his own attitude when tramps came to one or another of his ancient homes, he always asked if they would let him work for a meal, and soon remarked that his success was better when he sought first the women of the house, and then, smiling to show his very white teeth, spoke in clear and un-Indian English, which had the more effect coming from an evident Indian.

      “Since I am to be an Indian, Quonab, you must give me an Indian name,” he said after one of these episodes.

      “Ugh! Good! That's easy! You are 'Nibowaka,' the wise one.” For the Indian had not missed any of the points, and so he was named.

      Twenty or thirty miles a day they went now, avoiding the settlements along the river. Thus they saw nothing of Albany, but on the tenth day they reached Fort Edward, and for the first time viewed the great Hudson. Here they stayed as short a time as might be, pushed on by Glen's Falls, and on the eleventh night of the journey they passed the old, abandoned fort, and sighted the long stretch of Lake George, with its wooded shore, and glimpses of the mountains farther north.

      Now a new thought possessed them—“If only they had the canoe that they had abandoned on the Pipestave.” It came to them both at the sight of the limit less water, and especially when Rolf remembered that Lake George joined with Champlain, which again was the highway to all the wilderness.

      They camped now as they had fifty times before, and made their meal. The bright blue water dancing near was alluring, inspiring; as they sought the shore Quonab pointed to a track and said, “Deer.” He did not show much excitement, but Rolf did, and they returned to the camp fire with a new feeling of elation—they had reached the Promised Land. Now they must prepare for the serious work of finding a hunting ground that was not already claimed.

      Quonab, remembering the ancient law of the woods, that parcels off the valleys, each to the hunter first arriving, or succeeding the one who had, was following his own line of thought. Rolf was puzzling over means to get an outfit, canoe, traps, axes, and provisions. The boy broke silence.

      “Quonab, we must have money to get an outfit; this is the beginning of harvest; we can easily get work for a month. That will feed us and give us money enough to live on, and a chance to learn something about the country.”

      The reply was simple, “You are Nibowaka.”

      The farms were few and scattered here, but there were one or two along the lake. To the nearest one with standing grain Rolf led the way. But their reception, from the first brush with the dog to the final tilt with the farmer, was unpleasant—“He didn't want any darn red-skins around there. He had had two St. Regis Indians last year, and they were a couple of drunken good-for-nothings.”

      The next was the house of a fat Dutchman, who was just wondering how he should meet the compounded accumulated emergencies of late hay, early oats, weedy potatoes, lost cattle, and a prospective increase of his family, when two angels of relief appeared at his door, in copper-coloured skins.

      “Cahn yo work putty goood?

      “Yes, I have always lived on a farm,” and Rolf showed his hands, broad and heavy for his years.

      “Cahn yo mebby find my lost cows, which I haf not find, already yet?”

      Could they! it would be fun to try.

      “I giff yo two dollars you pring dem putty kvick.”

      So Quonab took the trail to the woods, and Rolf started into the potatoes with a hoe, but he was stopped by a sudden outcry of poultry. Alas! It was Skookum on an ill-judged partridge hunt. A minute later he was ignominiously chained to a penitential post, nor left it during the travellers' sojourn.

      In the afternoon Quonab returned with the cattle, and as he told Rolf he saw five deer, there was an unmistakable hunter gleam in his eye.

      Three cows in milk, and which had not been milked for two days, was a serious matter, needing immediate attention. Rolf had milked five cows twice a day for five years, СКАЧАТЬ