nished their morning
meal, so providentially placed within their reach, they gratefully
acknowledged the mercy of God in this thing.

Having refreshed themselves by bathing their hands and faces in the
lake, they cheerfully renewed their wanderings, though something both
to leave the cool shade and the spring for an untrodden path among the
hills and deep ravines that furrow the shores of the Rice Lake in so
remarkable a manner; and often did our weary wanderers pause to look
upon the wild glens and precipitous hills, where the fawn and the shy
deer found safe retreats, unharmed by the rifle of the hunter,--where
the osprey and white-headed eagle built their nests, unheeding and
unharmed. Twice that day, misled by following the track of the deer, had
they returned to the same spot,--a deep and lovely glen, which had once
been a water-course, but now a green and shady valley. This they named
the Valley of the Rock, from a remarkable block of red granite that
occupied a central position in the narrow defile; and here they prepared
to pass the second night on the Plains. A few boughs cut down and
interlaced with the shrubs round a small space cleared with Hector's
axe, formed shelter, and leaves and grass, strewed on the ground, formed
a bed, though not so smooth, perhaps, as the bark and cedar-boughs that
the Indians spread within their summer wigwams for carpets and couches,
or the fresh heather that the Highlanders gather on the wild Scottish
hills.

While Hector and Louis were preparing the sleeping-chamber, Catharine
busied herself in preparing the partridge for their supper. Having
collected some thin peelings from the ragged bark of a birch-tree, that
grew on the side of the steep bank to which she gave the appropriate
name of the "Birken shaw," she dried it in her bosom, and then beat it
fine upon a big stone, till it resembled the finest white paper. This
proved excellent tinder, the aromatic oil contained in the bark of the
birch being highly inflammable, Hector had prudently retained the flint
that they had used in the morning, and a fire was now lighted in front
of the rocky stone, and a forked stick, stuck in the ground, and bent
over the coals, served as a spit, on which, gipsy-fashion, the partridge
was suspended,--a scanty meal, but thankfully partaken of, though they
knew not how they should breakfast next morning, The children felt they
were pensioners on God's providence not less than the wild denizens