Off by pelting him
with snowballs; and once he came so near that I struck him with the
gad. I now began to be seriously alarmed, and from time to time,
shouted with all my strength; and you may imagine my joy when these
cries were answered by the report of a gun. My brothers had heard
me, and the discharge of a gun, for a moment, seemed to daunt the
wolf. He uttered a long howl, which was answered by the cries of a
large pack of the dirty brutes from the wood. It was only just light
enough to distinguish objects, and I had to stop and face my enemy,
to keep him at bay.
"I saw the skeleton forms of half-a-dozen more of them slinking
among the bushes that skirted a low island; and tired and cold, I
gave myself and the oxen up for lost, when I felt the ice tremble
on which I stood, and heard men running at a little distance. 'Fire
your guns!' I cried out, as loud as I could. My order was obeyed,
and such a yelling and howling immediately filled the whole forest
as would have chilled your very heart. The thievish varmints
instantly fled away into the bush.
"I never felt the least fear of wolves until that night; but when
they meet in large bands, like cowardly dogs, they trust to their
numbers, and grow fierce. If you meet with one wolf, you may be
certain that the whole pack are at no great distance."
We were fast approaching Sandy Point, a long white ridge of sand,
running half across the lake, and though only covered with scattered
groups of scrubby trees and brush, it effectually screened Stony
Lake from our view. There were so many beautiful flowers peeping
through the dwarf, green bushes, that, wishing to inspect them
nearer, Mat kindly ran the canoe ashore, and told me that he would
show me a pretty spot, where an Indian, who had been drowned during
a storm off that point, was buried. I immediately recalled the story
of Susan Moore's father, but Mat thought that he was interred upon
one of the islands farther up.
"It is strange," he said, "that they are such bad swimmers. The
Indian, though unrivalled by us whites in the use of the paddle, is
an animal that does not take readily to the water, and those among
them who can swim seldom use it as a recreation."
Pushing our way through the bushes, we came to a small opening in
the underwood, so thickly grown over with wild Canadian roses in
full blossom, that the air was impregnated with a delightful odour.
In the centre of this bed of sweets rose the humble mound that
protected the bones of the red man from the ravenous jaws of the
wolf and the wild cat.
