solemn arter it, and would set
and fetch up great long sythes. And once I asked him what made him so
sober and take on so, arter singin' it. He said, Micah, my good lad,
when I war a young man, I had a little French wife, that could run
like a hind and sing like a wild bird. Well, she died. The very last
thing she sung, was, that 'ere song. When I see how he felt, I never
asked him another question. He sot and sythed a spell and then got up,
took a most oncommon swig of old Jamaky and turned into his blanket".

Just as Micah ended this account, John caught sight of a large bird at
a distance directly ahead of them, and his attention became entirely
absorbed. It took flight from a partly decayed tree on the northern
bank, and commenced wheeling around, above the water. The canoe was
rapidly nearing this promising game.

Micah said not a word, but observed, in an apparently careless mood,
the movements of his young companion.

Suddenly, the bird poised himself for an instant in the air, then
closed his wings and shot downward. A whizzing sound! then a plash,
and he disappeared beneath the surface, throwing up the water into
sparkling foam-wreaths. He was absent but a moment, and then bore
upward into the air a large fish.

John's shot took him on the wing, and he dropped dead, his claws yet
grasping the fish, on the water's edge.

"Ruther harnsum than otherwise!" exclaimed Micah. "You've got your
dinner, Captin'".

And he put the canoe rapidly towards the river-bank, to pick up the
game.

They found it to be a large fish-hawk, with a good-sized salmon in its
fierce embrace. It was a noble specimen of the bird, tinted with
brown, ashy white, and blue, with eyes of deep orange color.

"Well, that are a prize", said Micah. "Them birds ain't common in
these parts, bein' as they mostly live on sea-coasts. But this un was
on his way seouth, and his journey has ended quite unexpected".

Saying which, he threw both bird and fish into the canoe, and darted
forward on the river again.

"When shall we reach the deer feeding-ground you spoke of, Micah?"

"O! not afore night", said Micah. "And then we mustn't go anyst it
till mornin'".

"I suppose you have brought down some scores of deer in your hunting
raids, Micah?"

"Why, yes,--takin' it by and large, I've handled over consid'able
many of 'em. 'Tis a critter I hate to kill, Captin', though I s'pose
it seounds soft to say so. Ef 't wan't for thinkin' they'll git pi