Have You Ever Revelled In This Feast Of
Soul, Fresh From The Busy Hum Of City Life - Perchance Strolling Up
A
mountain path with undulating plains of spotless whiteness behind you, or
else canopied by the leafy dome of odorous
Pines or green hemlock, with no
other companion but your trusty rifle, nor other sound but the hoot of the
Great Horned Owl, disturbed by the glare of your camp fire - or the rustle
of the passing hare, skulking fox, or browsing cariboo? Have you ever been
compelled, venturesome hunter as you are, with the lengthening shades of
evening, after a twenty miles' run, to abandon the blood-stained trail,
reserving for the morrow the slaying of the stricken cariboo? Can you
recall the sense of weariness, with which you retraced your heavy steps to
the camp - perspiring at every pore, - panting with thirst - famished -
perhaps bewildered with the flakes of the gathering storm - yea, so
exhausted, that the crackling of the pine faggots of your mountain hut -
watched over in your absence by your faithful Indian "Gabriel" [294] -
struck on your quickened senses amidst the winter gloom like heavenly
music - sounds as soft, as welcome as the first April sunbeam? Have you
ever had the hardiness to venture with an Indian guide and toboggin on an
angling tour far north in the Laurentian chain, to that Ultima Thule
sacred to the disciples of old Isaac. Snow Lake, over chasm, dale,
mountain, pending that month dear above all others to King Hiems -
inexorable January? If so, you can indeed boast of having held communion
with the grim God of Winter in some of his stern, though captivating,
moods. Nor are these the only charms which the capricious monarch has in
store.
Never shall I forget, one balmy March morning, sauntering along the green
uplands of Sillery, towards the city, while the "sun god" was pouring
overhead, waves of soft, purple light. The day previous, one of our
annual, equinoctial storms had careered over the country; first, wind and
snow; then wind and sleet, the latter dissolving into icy tears,
encircling captive Nature in thousands of weird, glossy crystals; every
tree of the forest, according to its instinct, its nature, writhing in the
conqueror's cold embrace - rigid, creaking, ready to snap in twain rather
than bend, as the red oak or sugar maple, or else meekly, submissively
curving to the earth its tapering, frosted limbs, like the silver birch -
elegant, though fragile, ornament of the Canadian park, or else, rearing
amid air a graceful net-work - waving, transparent sapphire-tinted
arabesques, stretched on amber pillars; witness the Golden Willow. Each
gleam of sunshine investing this gorgeous tapestry with all the glories of
Iris; here, rising above his compeers, a stately lord of the grove, hoary
with frost and years, whose outspreading boughs are burnished, as if every
twig had been touched by the hand of an enchanter, whilst there, under his
shade, bends a mountain ash, smeared with the crimsoned berries of the
preceding summer, now ice-coated bon-bons eagerly plucked by troops
of roseate grosbeaks resting on the whitened branches.
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