THE FOREST MAN.
During the momentary pause that followed the bringing up of the ice-boat
broadside to the breeze, they could hear the fluctuating surge of deep
waters, sucking, plunging--in that large dark patch on the ice. An
instant more of such rapid progression would have sunk them in it,
beyond all hope.
'Live and learn, they say,' remarked Sam Holt, rising from his prostrate
position beside the cargo; 'and I certainly had yet to learn that
breathing-holes could form at such an early period in the winter as
this. We had better retrace our steps a bit, Wynn; for the ice is
probably unsound for some distance about that split.'
'A merciful escape,' said Arthur, after they had worked their way
backwards a few yards.
'Ay, and even if we could have pulled up ourselves on the brink, the
sledge must have been soused to a dead certainty. Had the snow-flakes
been a trifle thicker, we wouldn't have seen the hole till we were
swimming, I guess. And it's well this cord of Uncle Zack's was rotten,
or the sail would have been too much for my pull.' One of the ropes
stretching the lower side of the blanket had snapped under the sudden
pressure of Sam Holt's vigorous jerk round, and thereby lessened the
forward force.
They made a long circuit of the deadly breathing-hole, and then ran
for the nearest shore on the farthest side. The deepening layer of
soft snow on the surface of the ice impeded the smooth action of the
runners considerably, and made travelling laborious.
Under the lee of a promontory covered with pines they drew up to rest
for a few minutes, and shake away loose snow.
'You know everything, Holt, so you can tell me why those treacherous
breaks in the ice are called breathing-holes.'
'I believe there's no reason to be given beyond a popular Canadian
superstition that a lake needs air as well as a human being, and must
have it by bursting these openings through its prison of ice. The
freezing is generally uniform all over the surface at first, and after a
month or so it cracks in certain spots, perhaps where there exists some
eddy or cross current in the water. But evidently the hole we saw a
while ago was never frozen at all. Uncle Zack would tell you it is over
some dismal cavern whence issue whirlwinds and foul air.'
'I think we should get on almost better without skates,' said Arthur,
when they had struggled a furlong farther.
'We are in a drift just now,' answered Mr. Holt; 'the wind has heaped
the snow up along here. Certainly the skates would be of more use to us
farther out on the pond; but I think we had better be cautious, and
continue to coast;' and so they did, having the fear of other possible
breathing-holes before their eyes.
How grandly roared the wind through the forest of pines with a steady
persistent swelling sound, as of breakers upon an iron shore, sweeping
off masses of snow wherewith to drown all landmarks in undistinguishable
drifts of whiteness, and driving aslant the descending millions of flakes,
till the outlines of the lake landscape were confused to the eyes which
tried to trace familiar copse or headland.
Sam Holt was secretly somewhat disquieted, and watched narrowly for
the cedars which denoted the Wynns' land. He would have abandoned the
ice-boat but for unwillingness to risk the fruit of their day's journey.
They must be near the swamp and the creek now; it was scarcely possible
they could have passed without recognising the cove whence they had
issued in the morning; and yet there was a chance. For the weather was
extremely thick, and daylight was fading quickly: the disguise of drifts
is bewildering, even to the most practised eye.
'Ha! there are our cedars at last!' exclaimed Arthur. 'How the snow has
buried them; they look stunted. I suppose up here's the creek;' and he
laid his hand beside his mouth to shout a signal to the shanty, which
was smothered immediately in the greater tumult of the storm.
Mr. Holt left the grounded ice-boat, and proceeded farther inland to
examine the locality, returning in a few minutes, when Arthur had his
skates off, with the information that this was merely a cove running
in among trees, and by no means the estuary of a stream.
'Now you know, Holt, if this isn't our creek it must be our swamp, and
I'm blinded and petrified on that lake. Do let us get overland to the
shanty. I'm certain we would travel faster; and we can haul up the planks
to-morrow or next day. You see it's getting quite dark.'
'And do you think the pathless forest will be more lightsome than the
open ice? No; we'd better kindle a fire, and camp out to-night. I'm
pretty sure we must have passed Cedar Creek without knowing.'
Arthur was already so drowsy from the excessive cold that he was
only glad of the pretext for remaining still, and yielding to the
uncontrollable propensity. But Mr. Holt pulled him on his feet and
commanded him to gather brushwood and sticks, while he went about
himself picking birch-bark off the dead and living trees. This he spread
under the brush and ignited with his tinder-box. The sight of the flame
seemed to wake up Arthur with a shock from the lethargy that was stealing
over his faculties. Mr. Holt had chosen a good site for his fire in the
lee of a great body of pines, whose massive stems broke the wind; so
the blaze quickened and prospered, till a great bed of scarlet coals
and ends of fagots remained of the first relay of fuel, and another was
heaped on. Now Arthur was glowing to his fingers' ends, thoroughly wide
awake, and almost relishing the novelty of his lodgings for the night;
with snow all around, curtaining overhead, carpeting under foot.
'Curious way they camp out in the Far West,' said Holt, with his arms
round his knees, as he sat on their hemlock mattress and gazed into the
fire, wherein all old memories seem ever to have a trysting-place with
fancy. And so scenes of his roving years came back to him.
'You must know that out in the Hudson's Bay territory the snow is often
ten or fourteen feet deep, not only in drifts, but in smooth even layers,
obliterating the country inequalities wonderfully. That's the native
land of snow-shoes and of furs, where your clothes must be mainly of
both for half the year. But I was going to tell you how the _voyageurs_
build a fire when they have to camp out on a winter's night, and there's
twelve feet of snow between them and the solid ground.'
'Sheer impossibility,' said Arthur presumptuously; 'the fire would work
a hole down.'
'You shall hear. First, they cut down a lot of trees--green timber--about
twenty feet or more in length. These are laid closely parallel on the
snow, which has previously been beaten to a little consistency by
snow-shoes; on the platform thus made the fire is lit, and it burns
away merrily.'
'Don't the trees ever burn through?' asked Arthur.
'Seldom; but the heat generally works a cavity in the snow underneath,
sometimes quite a chasm, seven or eight feet deep--fire above, water
below. Ha! I'm glad to see my old friend the Great Bear looking through
over the pines yonder. Our storm has done its worst.'
'Holt, though I'm rather hungry and sleepy, I'm heartily glad of this
night's outing, for one reason: you won't be able to leave us to-morrow,
and so are booked for another week, old fellow.'
It seemed irrevocably the case; and under this conviction Arthur rolled
himself in the blanket (cut from the spar of the ice-boat), and went
into dreamland straight from his brushwood bed, Mr. Holt continuing
to sit by the fire gazing into it as before; which sort of gazing,
experienced people say, is very bad for the eyes. Perhaps it was that
which caused a certain moisture to swell into most visible bright drops,
filling the calm grey orbs with unspeakable sadness for a little while.
The Great Bear climbed higher round the icy pole; the sky had ceased
to snow before the absorbed thinker by the fire noticed the change of
weather. Then he rose gently, laid further wood on the blazing pile,
threw brush about Arthur's feet and body for additional warmth, and,
skates in hand, went down to the lake to explore.
On reaching the point of the headland, he looked round. The weather
was much clearer; but westwards a glimmering sheen of ice--black land
stretching along, black islands, snow-crowned, rising midway afar.
Eastward, ha! that is what should have been done hours ago. A fire
burned on the edge of the woods at some distance. So they had really
passed Cedar Creek unawares, as he suspected from the nature of the
ground and trees.
While Robert and Andy crouched by their fire, feeding it up to full
blaze with the most resinous wood they could find, the distant shout
of the coming travellers gladdened their ears. The servant flung his
whole stock of balsam on the beacon at once, causing a most portentous
flame-burst, and sprang up with a wild 'hurroo!' wielding one half-burnt
fagot _a la_ shillelah about his head.
'Oh, then, Mister Robert, achora, it's yerself is the janius; an' to
think of mekin' a lighthouse to guide 'em wid, an' here they are safe
home by the manes of it. But now, sir, if ye'll take my advice, as we're
always lost when we goes anywhere by ourselves, we ought niver part for
the futhur, an' thin we'll all go asthray together safe an' sound.'
'Let's warm ourselves at this glorious fire before we go up to the
shanty,' said Arthur, stretching out his feet to the fire. 'Pity to let
it waste its sweetness on the desert air.'
So they stood explaining matters by the fire for a few minutes, till
Andy, who was never tired of heaping on fresh fuel, came forward with an
armful and a puzzled face.
'Mr. Holt, there's somethin' quare in that three, sir, which has a big
hole in it full of dhry sticks an' brush, and there's something woolly
inside, sir, that I felt wid me two hands; an' more be token it's a big
baste, whatever it is.'
'A bear, probably,' said Mr. Holt, as he warmed the sole of one foot.
'Better let him alone till morning, and tuck in his bedclothes again for
to-night, poor fellow.' But Arthur had started up to investigate, and
must pull the black fleece for his personal satisfaction.
'Oh, throth he's stirrin' now!' exclaimed Andy, who had begun to cram
the orifice with the former stuffing of dried bough and brush. 'We've
woke him up, Masther Arthur, if it's asleep he was at all, the rogue;
an' now he's sthrugglin' out of the hole wid all his might. Keep in
there, you big villyan, you don't dare to offer to come out;' for Andy
set his shoulder against the great carcase, which nevertheless sheered
round till muzzle and paws could be brought into action, and their use
illustrated on Andy's person.
'Och, murther!' roared the sufferer; 'he has his arms round me, the
baste; he's squeezing me into m--m--mash!'
A blazing stick, drawn from the fire by Mr. Holt's hand, here struck
the bear's nose and eyes; which, conjoined with Andy's own powerful
wrenching, caused him to loosen his hold, and a ball from the rifle
which Robert had fortunately brought down as the companion of their
night watch, finished his career.
'Well done, Bob!' when, after a run of thirty yards or so, they stood
beside the prostrate enemy; 'you've won our first bear-skin. Now we
shall see what the paws are like, in the way of eatables; don't you say
they're delicious, Holt?'
Borne upon two strong poles, the bear made his way up to the shanty, and
was housed for the rest of the night. Poor Andy was found to be severely
scratched by the long sharp claws. 'Sure I'm glad 'twas none of yerselves
he tuk to huggin',' said the faithful fellow; 'an' scrapin' as if 'twas
a pratie he wanted to peel!'
He had his revenge on the forepaws next morning when Mr. Holt cut them
off, some time before breakfast, and set them in a mound of hot ashes
to bake, surrounding and crowning them further with live coals. Bruin
himself was dragged outside into the snow, preparatory to the operation
of skinning and cutting up into joints of excellent meat.
'Do you know, I saw an amazing resemblance to a fur-coated man, as he
stood up last night before Robert's shot,' said Arthur.
'You're not the first to see it,' replied Holt. 'The Indians call
him "the forest man," and the Lower Canadians the "bourgeois;" they
attribute to him a sagacity almost human; the Crees and Ojibbeways fancy
him an enchanted being, and will enter into conversation with him when
they meet in the woods.'
'Yet they take an unfair advantage of his paws.'
'That's true: my cookery must be almost done.' And he re-entered the hut
to dish up his dainty. 'Come, who'll feast with me?'
'Appearances are much against them,' said Robert, eyeing the
charcoal-looking paws, which presented soles uppermost on the trencher.
Mr. Holt scooped out a portion on to his own plate, and used no further
persuasion.
''Twould never do not to know the taste of bear's paw,' said Arthur, as
if winding himself up to the effort of picking a small bit. Mr. Holt was
amused to see the expression of enlightened satisfaction that grew on
his face. 'Oh, Bob, 'tis really capital. That's only a prejudice about
its black look,' helping himself again. 'The Indians aren't far removed
from epicures, when this is their pet dish.'
'Well,' observed Mr. Holt, filling his horn cup with tea from the
kettle, 'they equally relish fried porcupines and skunks; but some of
their viands might tempt an alderman--such as elk's nose, beaver's tail,
and buffalo's hump.'
'Holt,' said Arthur, scooping the paw a third time, 'it seemed to me
that chap had fixed himself in a hole barely big enough, to judge by the
way he wriggled out.'
'Very likely. "Bears are the knowingest varmint in all creation," as
Uncle Zack would say. They sometimes watch for days before entering a
tree, and then choose the smallest opening possible, for warmth's sake,
and scrape up brush and moss to conceal themselves. I've known the
hollow tree to be such a tight fit that the hunters were compelled to
cut it open to get at the bear after he was shot. I suspect the heat of
our fire had roused this one, even before Andy pulled away the brush, or
he wouldn't ha' been so lively.'
'What's the meat like, Holt? I hope it don't taste carnivorous.'
'You'll hardly know it from beef, except that the shorter grain makes it
tenderer; for the bear lives on the best products of the forest. He'll
sit on his haunches before a serviceberry tree, bend the branches with
his paws, and eat off the red fruit wholesale. He'll grub with his
claws for the bear potatoes, and chew them like tobacco. He'll pick the
kernels out of nuts, and help himself to your maize and fall wheat when
you have them, as well as to your sucking pigs and yearly calves.'
'Then we may fairly eat him in return,' said Robert; 'but I'll leave the
paws to you and Arthur.'
'Thank you for the monopoly. Now these knives are sufficiently sharp.'
Sam Holt had been putting an edge on them at the grindstone during his
talk. 'Come and have your lesson in fur-making, for I must be off.'
'Off! oh, nonsense; not to-day,' exclaimed both. But he was quite
unpersuadeable when once his plan was fixed. He took the stage at
Greenock that afternoon.