n which Nathan proposed to cook and enjoy his savoury
treasure, at ease and in safety, was enclosed by hills; of which the one
by which they descended into it fell down in a rolling slope densely
covered with trees; while the other, rocky, barren, and almost naked,
rose precipitously up, a grim picture of solitude and desolation. A
scanty brook, oozing along through the swampy bottom of the hollow, and
supplied by a spring near its head, at which the two friends halted to
prepare their meal, ran meandering away among alders and other swampy
plants, to find exit into a larger vale that opened below, though hidden
from the travellers by the winding of the rocky ridge before them.

In this lonely den, Nathan and Roland began straightway to disencumber
themselves of arms and provisions, seeming well satisfied with its
convenience. But not so little Peter; who, having faithfully accompanied
them so far, now following numbly at his master's heels, and now, in
periods of alarm or doubt, taking post in front, the leader of the party,
uplifted his nose, and fell to snuffing about him in a way that soon
attracted his master's notice. Smelling first around the spring, and then
giving a look both up and down the glen, as if to satisfy himself there
was nothing wrong in either of those quarters, he finally began to ascend
the rocky ridge, snuffing as he went, and ever and anon looking back to
his master and soliciting his attention by a wag of his tail.

"Truly, thee did once wag to me in vain!" said Nathan, snatching up his
gun, and looking volumes of sagacious response at his brute ally, "but
thee won't catch me napping again; though, truly, what thee can smell
here, where is neither track of man nor print of beast, truly, Peter, I
have no idea!"

With these words, he crept up the hill himself, following in little
Peter's wake; and Roland, who also grasped his rifle, as Nathan had done,
though without perhaps attaching the same importance to Peter's note of
warning, thought fit to imitate his example.

In this manner, cautiously crawling up, the two friends reached the crest
of the hill; and peering over a precipice of fifty or more feet sheer
descent, with which it suddenly dipped into a wild but beautiful little
valley below, beheld a scene that, besides startling them somewhat out of
their tranquillity, caused both to bless their good fortune they had not
neglected the warning of their brute confederate.

The vale below, li