It was on a cold winter morning long ago, that Robin Gore, a bold hunter
of the backwoods of America, entered his parlour and sat him down to
breakfast.
Robin's parlour was also his dining-room, and his drawing-room, besides
being his bedroom and his kitchen. In fact, it was the only room in his
wooden hut, except a small apartment, opening off it, which was a
workshop and lumber-room.
Robin's family consisted of himself, and his wife, and his son Roy, who
was twelve years of age--and his daughter Nelly, who was eight, or
thereabout. In addition to these, his household comprised a nephew,
Walter and an Irishman, Larry O'Dowd. The former was tall, strong,
fearless, and twenty. The latter was stout, short, powerful, and forty.
The personal history of Robin Gore, to the point at which we take it up,
runs briefly thus:--
He had been born in a backwood's settlement, had grown up and married in
the little hamlet in which he had been born, and hunted around it
contentedly until he was forty years of age. But, as population
increased, he became restive. He disliked restraint; resolved to take
his wife and family into the wilderness and, after getting his nephew
and an Irish adventurer to agree to accompany him, carried his
resolution into effect.
He travelled several hundreds of miles into the woods--beyond the most
remote settlement--built three wooden huts, surrounded them with a tall
stockade, set up a flagstaff in the centre thereof, and styled the whole
affair, "Fort Enterprise."
"I'm sorry to bring you to such a lonesome spot, Molly, my dear," said
Robin, as he sat on the trunk of a fallen tree, on the afternoon of the
day on which he arrived at the scene of his future home; "it'll be
rayther tryin' at first, but you'll soon get used to it, and we won't be
bothered hereaway wi' all the new-fangled notions o' settlement folk.
We'll dwell in the free wilderness, where there are no tyrannical laws
to hamper a man, an' no nonsensical customs to fix the fashion of his
coat an' leggins. Besides, you'll have Roy an' Nelly an' Walter an'
Larry to keep you company, lass, not to mention our neighbours to look
in upon now and again."
"Very true, Robin," replied the wife, "I have no doubt it will be quite
cheery and homelike in course of time."
She looked out upon the broad bosom of the lake which lay before the
site of their forest home, and sighed. It was evident that Mrs Gore
had a strong partiality for the laws and customs which her husband
abhorred.
The "neighbours" to whom Robin referred lived in a leather tent twenty
miles distant from the Fort. They were an Indian, named "The Black
Swan," his wife, named "The White Swan," and a half-caste trapper, whose
proper name was unknown to all save himself. His cognomen in the
wilderness was "Slugs," a name which originated in his frequent use of
clipped pieces of lead instead of shot in the loading of his gun.