e for a time followed the course of Black River. Now and again
Skipper Zeb paused and turned aside to set a trap, where the tracks of
martens or minks indicated their presence. At intervals he took bunches
of a dozen or more traps from trees where he had hung them the previous
spring when the trapping season had ended. Charley wondered how it was
possible for him to remember where he had left them, and asked:

"How do you ever find the traps where you left them? The places all look
alike to me."

"Why, 'tis easy enough, lad. This bunch I hangs in the only hackmatack
tree handy about. I just looks up and sees the tree, and there I finds
the traps just where I leaves un."

Even still Charley could not understand how Skipper Zeb could know where
to look for the particular hackmatack tree, standing alone among the
spruces and quaking aspens, for at several points he saw lone
hackmatacks in similar surroundings. Presently he was to learn that the
woodsman by long practice learns to know every tree or bush that is even
slightly out of the ordinary along his trail, and so trained is he in
the art of observation that his subconscious mind records these with no
effort on his part. Thus to the woodsman the trail over which he has
traveled two or three times, and often but once, becomes as familiar to
him as streets to the city dweller.

After two hours on the trail, Skipper Zeb announced that they would
"boil the kettle," and have a "snack" to eat. Already the boys were
ravenously hungry, and Skipper Zeb chuckled merrily as he observed their
keen enjoyment as they ate.

"Settin' up traps makes for hunger," said he. "Fill up now."

"I was just hollow!" confessed Charley.

"And I was hungrier'n a starved wolf!" added Toby.

Their course now left the river valley, and presently came upon a wide
frozen marsh, or "mesh" as Skipper Zeb called it.

"'Tis here on the meshes we finds the best fox footin'," he explained to
Charley.

It was not long until he found tracks that he said were fox tracks, and
in various places on the marsh set three traps, which were considerably
larger than those set for marten or mink, and had two springs instead of
one, and he used much greater care in setting them than in setting those
for marten and mink. With his sheathknife he cut out a square of snow,
and excavated in the snow a place large enough to accommodate the trap.
Over the trap a thin crust of snow was placed, and so carefully fitted