and now and then we
made our way across the mouth of a small tributary on a kind of net-work
of alders. So we went tumbling on in the dark, being on the shady side,
effectually scaring all the moose and bears that might be thereabouts. At
length we came to a standstill, and Joe went forward to reconnoitre; but
he reported that it was still a continuous rapid as far as he went, or
half a mile, with no prospect of improvement, as if it were coming down
from a mountain. So we turned about, hunting back to the camp through the
still water. It was a splendid moonlight night, and I, getting sleepy as
it grew late,--for I had nothing to do,--found it difficult to realize
where I was. This stream was much more unfrequented than the main one,
lumbering operations being no longer carried on in this quarter. It was
only three or four rods wide, but the firs and spruce through which it
trickled seemed yet taller by contrast. Being in this dreamy state, which
the moonlight enhanced, I did not clearly discern the shore, but seemed,
most of the time, to be floating through ornamental grounds,--for I
associated the fir-tops with such scenes;--very high up some Broadway, and
beneath or between their tops, I thought I saw an endless succession of
porticos and columns, cornices and facades, verandas and churches. I did
not merely fancy this, but in my drowsy state such was the illusion. I
fairly lost myself in sleep several times, still dreaming of that
architecture and the nobility that dwelt behind and might issue from it;
but all at once I would be aroused and brought back to a sense of my
actual position by the sound of Joe's birch horn in the midst of all this
silence calling the moose, _ugh, ugh, oo-oo-oo-oo-oo-oo_, and I prepared
to hear a furious moose come rushing and crashing through the forest, and
see him burst out on to the little strip of meadow by our side.

But, on more accounts than one, I had had enough of moose-hunting. I had
not come to the woods for this purpose, nor had I foreseen it, though I
had been willing to learn how the Indian manoeuvred; but one moose killed
was as good, if not as bad, as a dozen. The afternoon's tragedy, and my
share in it, as it affected the innocence, destroyed the pleasure of my
adventure. It is true, I came as near as is possible to come to being a
hunter and miss it, myself; and as it is, I think that I could spend a
year in the woods, fishing and hunting, just enough to sustain myself,