When their weapons were complete our three travellers started on their
journey of exploration in the new-found land.
Captain Trench armed himself with a strong, heavily-made cross-bow, and
a birch-bark quiver full of bolts. Paul Burns carried a bow as long as
himself, with a quiver full of the orthodox "cloth-yard shafts." Oliver
provided himself with a bow and arrows more suited to his size, and,
being naturally sanguine, he had also made for himself a sling with the
cord he chanced to possess and the leathern tongue of one of his shoes.
He likewise carried a heavy bludgeon, somewhat like a policeman's baton,
which was slung at his side. Not content with this, he sought and
obtained permission to carry the axe in his belt. Of course, none of
the bolts or arrows had metal points; but that mattered little, as the
wood of which they were made was very hard, and could be sharpened to a
fine point; and, being feathered, the missiles flew straight to the mark
when pointed in the right direction.
"Now, captain," said Paul, on the morning they set out, "let's see what
you can do with your cross-bow at the first bird you meet. I mean the
first eatable bird; for I have no heart to kill the little twitterers
around us for the mere sake of practice."
"That will I right gladly," said Trench, fixing his bow and string, and
inserting a bolt with a confident air.
"And there's a chance, daddy! See! a bird that seems to wish to be
shot, it sits so quietly on the tree."
The seaman raised his weapon slowly to his shoulder, shut the wrong eye,
glared at the bird with the other, took a long unsteady aim, and sent
his bolt high over the creature's head, as well as very much to one
side.
"Might have been worse!" said the captain.
"Might have been better," returned Paul, with equal truth. "Now it's my
turn."
The bird, all ignorant of the fate intended for it, sat still,
apparently in surprise.
Paul drew his cloth-yard shaft to his ear and let fly. It went
apparently in search of the captain's bolt.
"Now me!" cried the impatient Olly, in a hoarse whisper, as he placed a
stone in the sling and whirled it round his head. His companions drew
off! There was a "burring" noise as the stone sped on its mission and
struck the tree-stem with a sounding crack, three yards from the bird,
which, learning wisdom from experience, at last took wing.
In anticipation of their chance coming round again, both Paul and the
captain had got ready their artillery, and Oliver hastily put another
stone in his sling. A look and exclamation of disappointment were given
by each as the bird vanished, but just at that moment a large rabbit
darted across their path. Whiz! twang! burr! went bolt and bow and
stone, and that rabbit, pierced in head and heart, and smitten on flank,
fell to rise no more.
"Strange!" said Trench, in open-mouthed surprise, "I've often heard of
coincidences, but I never did see or hear of the like of that."
"All three to hit it at once!" exclaimed Paul.
"Ay, and all three of us doin' our best to hit it, too," exclaimed
Oliver.
"Just so--that's the puzzle, lad," rejoined the captain. "If we had
been tryin' to hit something else now, there would have been nothing
strange about it! But to hit what we all aimed at--"
Apparently the captain failed to find words adequately to express his
ideas, for he did not finish the sentence; meanwhile Paul picked up the
rabbit and attached it to his belt. After this, advancing through the
woods in a north-westerly direction, they made for a somewhat elevated
ridge, hoping to obtain from that point a more extended view of the
land.
Towards noon, feeling hungry, they began to look out for a suitable spot
whereon to lunch, or rather to dine; for while travelling on foot in
wild countries men usually find it convenient to take a very substantial
meal about, or soon after, noon.
"To have water handy," remarked Paul, as they stopped to look round, "is
essential to comfort as well as cookery."
"Look there, away to the nor'-west o' that bunch o' trees," said the
captain, pointing to a distant spot, "there's a depression in the ground
there; and from the lie o' the land all round I should say we shall find
a stream o' some sort near it."
"I hope so," said Oliver; "for I shall want water to wash the rabbit
with, and I have a strong hope that we may find fish in the rivers of
this land, and although my hooks are big, I think the fish may not be
particular, seein' that they have never before been tempted in that
way."
"That's true, Olly; I hope you won't be disappointed. But what makes
you want to wash the rabbit, my boy?" asked the captain; "it is not
dirty?"
"Perhaps not; but I don't quite relish the dirty work of cleaning out a
rabbit before cooking it, so I want to try the plan of cutting it open,
holding it under water, and scraping out the inside while in that
position."
"My son, you won't be so particular when you've been a few weeks huntin'
in the wild woods. But what about the hair?"
"Oh, we can singe that off, daddy."
"What! singe off wet hair? And the skin--I doubt we might find that
tough?"
The young cook--for such he became to the exploring expedition--looked
puzzled.
"I never skinned a rabbit," he said, "but no doubt it is easy enough.
I'll just cut it open at the head--or tail--and pull it off like a
glove."
"Not quite so easily done as that" remarked Paul, with a laugh; "but I
happen to know something about skinning birds and beasts, Olly, so make
your mind easy. I will show you how to do it."
"You happen to know something about almost everything, I think," said
the captain. "Tell me now, d'ye happen to know what sort o' beast it is
that I see starin' at us over the bushes yonder?"
"No, Master Trench, I do not; but it looks marvellously like a deer of
some sort," said Paul, as he hastily fitted an arrow to his bow. But
before he could discharge it the animal wisely retired into the shelter
of its native wilds.
By this time, having walked smartly, they had gained the crest of one of
the lower ridges, or plateaus, that rose in gentle slopes from the rocky
shore, and there, as had been anticipated, they found a small rivulet,
such as Americans would call a creek, and Scotsmen a burn. It flowed in
a north-easterly direction, and was broken by several small rapids and
cascades.
With a little shout of satisfaction, Oliver ran down to its banks,
getting his hooks out as he went. Arriving at the margin of a deep
pool, he bent over it and gazed earnestly down. The water was as clear
as crystal, showing every stone at the bottom as if it had been covered
merely with a sheet of glass, and there, apparently undisturbed by the
intruder, lay several large fish.
What they were he knew not--cared not. Sufficient for him that they
seemed large and fat. His first impulse was to turn and shout the
discovery to his companions; but seeing that they had already set to
work to cut firewood a little higher up the stream, he checked himself.
"I'll catch a fish first maybe," he muttered, as he quickly adjusted to
his piece of cord one of the smallest cod-hooks he possessed. A few
minutes sufficed for this; but when he was ready, it occurred to him
that he had no bait. He looked around him, but nothing suitable was to
be seen, and he was about to attempt the all but hopeless task of
tearing up the soil with his fingers in search of a worm, when his eyes
fell on a small bright feather that had been dropped by some passing
bird. "Happy thoughts" occurred to people in the days of which we
write, even as now, though they were not recognised or classified as
such.
Fly-fishing was instantly suggested to the eager boy. He had often
tried it in Old England; why not try it in Newfoundland? A very brief
period sufficed to unwind a thread from the cord, and therewith to
attach the feather to the hook. He had no rod, and neither time nor
patience to make one. Gathering the cord into a coil, such as wharfmen
form when casting ropes to steamers; he swung it round his head, and
hove his hook half-way across the glassy pool.
The fish looked up at him, apparently in calm surprise--certainly
without alarm. Then Olly began to haul in the hook. It was a fearful
fly to look at, such as had never desecrated those waters since the days
of Adam, yet those covetous fish rushed at it in a body. The biggest
caught it, and found himself caught! The boy held on tenderly, while
the fish in wild amazement darted from side to side, or sprang high into
the air. Oliver was far too experienced a fisher not to know that the
captive might be but slightly hooked, so he played it skilfully, casting
a sidelong glance now and then at his busy comrades in the hope that
they had not observed him.
At last the fish became tired, and the fisher drew it slowly to the
bank--a four- or five-pound trout at the very least! Unfortunately the
bank was steep, and the boy found, to his distress, that the hook had
only caught hold slightly of the fish's lip. To lift out the heavy
creature with the line was therefore impossible, to catch hold of it
with the hand was almost equally so; for when he lay down and stretched
out his arm as far as possible, he could scarcely touch it with the end
of his finger.
"If it makes another dash it'll escape," muttered the anxious boy, as he
slid further and further down the bank--a hairbreadth at a time.
Just then the fish showed symptoms of revival. Olly could stand this no
longer. He made a desperate grasp and caught it by the gills just as
the hook came away. The act destroyed what little balance he had
retained, and he went with a sharp short yell into the pool.
Paul looked up in time to see his friend's legs disappear. He ran to
the spot in considerable alarm, supposing that the boy might have taken
a fit, and not knowing whether he could swim. He was relieved, however,
to find that Olly, on reappearing, struck out manfully with one hand for
a shallow place at the lower end of the pool, while with the other he
pressed some object tightly to his bosom.
"You don't mean to say," exclaimed Paul, as he assisted his friend out
of the water, "that you went in for that splendid trout and caught it
with your hands!"
"You saw me dive," replied the boy, throwing the fish down with affected
indifference, and stooping to wring the water from his garments as well
as to hide his face; "and you don't suppose, surely, that I caught it
with my feet. Come, look at the depth I had to go down to catch him!"
Seizing his prize, Olly led his friend to the spot where he had fallen
in, and pointed with a look of triumph to the clear, deep pool. At the
moment a smile of intelligence lit up Paul's features, and he pointed to
the extemporised fly-hook which still dangled from the bank.
Bursting into a hearty fit of laughter, the successful fisher ran up to
the encampment, swinging the trout round his head, to the surprise and
great satisfaction of his father, who had already got the fire alight
and the rabbit skinned.
Need it be said that the meal which followed was a hearty one, though
there was no variety save roast rabbit, roast trout, and roast pork,
with the last of the cakes as pudding?
"A first-rate dinner!" exclaimed Paul, after swallowing a draft of
sparkling water from the stream.
"Not bad," admitted Captain Trench, "if we only had something stronger
than water to wash it down."
Paul made no reply to this remark, but he secretly rejoiced in the
necessity which delivered his friend from the only foe that had power to
overcome him.
"Now," remarked Paul, when he had finished dinner, "I will strengthen my
bow before starting, for it does not send the arrows with sufficient
force, and the only way to do that, that I can think of, is to shorten
it."
"And I will feather the last arrow I made," said Oliver, drawing the
shaft in question out of his quiver.
"Well, as my bow and bolts are all ship-shape and in perfect order, I
will ramble to the top of the ridge before us and take a look out
ahead."
So saying the captain departed, and the other two were soon so deeply
absorbed in their work and in conversation about future plans that they
had almost forgotten him when a loud shout caused them to start up. On
looking towards the ridge they beheld Captain Trench tossing his arms
wildly in the air, and shouting and gesticulating violently.
"Sees savages, I think," said Paul.
"Or gone mad!" cried Olly.
Catching up their arms, the two ran hastily to the top of the ridge,
where they arrived perspiring and panting, to find that their excitable
comrade had only gone into ecstasies about the magnificent scenery that
had burst upon his sight.