l the birds, is the eagle, when he takes his descending
stoop from his place away up in the sky. He cleaves the air like a
bullet, and so swift is his career that the eye can scarcely trace his
flight. But, hark! all is still now, save the piping notes of the
little peeper along the shore. Wait, however, a moment. There, hear
that venerable podunker off to the right, with his deep bass, like the
sound of a brazen serpent. Listen! another deep voice on the left has
fallen in. There, another right over against us! another and another
still! a dozen! a hundred! a thousand! ten thousand! a million of
them! close by us! far off! on the right hand and on the left! here!
there! everywhere! until above, around us, all through the woods, all
along the shore, all over the lake is a solid roar, impenetrable to
any other sound, surging and swaying, rolling and swelling as if all
the voices in the world were concentrated in one stupendous concert.

But, hark! the roar is dying away; voice after voice drops out; here
and there is one laggard in the song, still dragging out the chorus.
Now all is still again, save the note of the little peeper along the
shore. In two minutes that band will strike up again. The roar will go
bellowing over the lake through the woods, to be thrown from hill to
hill, to die away into silence again; and so it will be through all
the long night, and until the sun looks out from among the tree tops
in the morning. Touch that solemn looking old croaker on yonder broad
leaf of that pond lily, with the end of your fishing rod, while the
music is at the highest, he will send forth a quick discordant and
cracked cry, like that of a greedy dog choked with a bone, as he
plunges for the bottom; and note how suddenly that sound will be
repeated, and how quick the roar of the frogs will be hushed into
silence. That is a cry of alarm, a note of danger, and every frog
within hearing understands its import.

Is it asked _where_ we are? I answer, we are on the Lower Saranac
Lake, just on the south point, at the entrance of the romantic little
bay, at the head of which stands Martin's Lake House, the only human
dwelling in sight of this beautiful sheet of water. On the point where
we now are, long ago, was the log shanty of a hunter and fisherman,
surrounded by an acre or two of cleared land. But its occupant moved
deeper into the wilderness, over on the waters of the Rackett, many
years since; the log shanty has rotted a