At the end of this yoke is a
round iron projection, made to fit into a socket in the upper rave of
the boat. The craft is turned bottom upwards, the yoke adjusted to the
shoulders, the iron projections fitted into the sockets, and the
boatman marches off with his boat, like a turtle with his shell upon
his back. He will carry it thus sometimes half a mile before
stopping to rest.
With us were to go two staid and sober stag hounds, grave in aspect
and trained and experienced, almost, in woodcraft, as their masters;
animals that had been reared together, and who possessed the rare
instinct of returning always to the shanty from which they started,
however far the chase may have led them. It was a glorious sound in
the old forests, the music of those two hounds, as their voices rang
out bold and free, like a bugle, and went, ringing through the forest,
echoing among the mountains and dying away over the lakes. But of that
hereafter.
Our little fleet swung out upon the water, while the sun was yet
hanging like a great torch among the tops of the trees, on the eastern
hills. It was a beautiful morning, so fresh, so genial, so balmy. A
pleasant breeze came sweeping lazily over the lake, and went sighing
and moaning among the old forest trees. All around us were glad
voices. The partridge drummed upon his log; the squirrels chattered as
they chased each other up and down the great trunks of the trees; the
loon lifted up his clarion voice away out upon the water; the eagle
and the osprey screamed as they hovered high above us in the air,
while a thousand merry voices came from out the old woods, all
mingling in the harmony of nature's gladness.
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