If you should visit it within a year or two, you
will perhaps notice some forked stakes standing a few feet from the
place of the fire, and a bed of withered and dry boughs (now fresh
and green). Well, our tents were stretched over those stakes, those
boughs were our bed, and those charred chunks are the remains of our
campfire, that sent a sepulchral light among the forest trees around.
The sounds that come upon the ear during the night in a far off place
like this, are peculiar. The old owl hoots mournfully, the frogs
bellow hoarsely along the reedy shore, while the tree toads are
quavering from among the branches of the scrubby trees that grow along
the rocky banks; the whippoorwill pipes shrilly in the forest depths;
the breeze murmurs among the foliage of the tall old pines, while the
everlasting roar of the waters, as they go tumbling down the rocks, is
always heard. However diversified these sounds may be, they all invite
to repose. They fall soothingly upon the ear, and though all are
distinctly heard, yet strange as it may seem, there is a strong
impression upon the mind of the deep silence pervading the forest.
This impression is doubtless occasioned by the utter dissimilarity
between the voices one hears in the day, from those which fall upon
the ear in the night time. The former are all joyous and happy, full
of gladness and merriment, full of life and animation; the latter
solemn, deep, profound, lulling to the senses; not sorrowful nor sad,
yet still such as form a calm and quiet lullaby, under the influence
of which one glides away into slumber, and sleeps quietly until dawn.
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