as two big porkypines an' a monstrous big wildcat," answered Mrs.
Gammit in triumph.

"Did ye ketch 'em at it?" asked the woodsman, with a faint note of
sarcasm in his voice. But the sarcasm glanced off Mrs. Gammit's
armour. She regarded the question as a quite legitimate one.

"No, I kain't say as I did, _exackly_," she replied. "But they come
anosin' round, an' to teach 'em a lesson to keep ther noses out o'
other people's hens' nests I shook a little pepper over 'em. I tell
ye, they took to the woods, asneezin' that bad I thought ye might 'a'
heard 'em all the way over here. Ye'd 'ave bust yerself laffin', ef ye
could 'a' seed 'em rootin'. An' since then, Mr. Barron, I git all the
aigs I want. Don't ye talk to me o' _weasels_--the skinny little rats.
_They_ ain't wuth noticin', no more'n a chipmunk."

The Battle in the Mist

In the silver-grey between dawn and sunrise the river was filled with
mist from bank to bank. It coiled and writhed and rolled, here
thinning, there thickening, as if breathed upon irregularly by
innumerable unseen mouths. But there was no wind astir; and the
brown-black, glistening current beneath the white folds was glassy
smooth save where the occasional big swirls boiled up with a swishing
gurgle, or the running wave broke musically around an upthrust
shoulder of rock or a weedy snag. The river was not wide--not more
than fifty yards from bank to bank; but from the birch canoe slipping
quietly down along one shore, just outside the fringe of alder
branches, the opposite shore was absolutely hidden. There was nothing
to indicate that an opposite shore existed, save that now and again
the dark top of a soaring pine or elm would show dimly for a moment,
seeming to float above the ghostly gulfs of mist.

The canoe kept close along the shore for guidance, as one feels one's
way along a wall in the dark. The channel, moreover, was deep and
clear in shore; while out under the mist the soft noises of ripples
proclaimed to the ears of the two canoeists the presence of frequent
rock and snag and shallow. Lest they should run upon unseen dangers
ahead, the canoeists were travelling very slowly, the bow-man resting
with his paddle across the gunwales before him, while the stern-man,
his paddle noiselessly waving like the fin of a trout, did no more
than keep his craft to her course and let her run with the current.

Down along the shore, keeping just behind the canoe and close to the
water