Away in the Wilderness | Page 3

to the ground.
"What have you shot? what have you shot?" cried a shrill and somewhat weak voice in the distance. In another moment the owner of the voice appeared, running eagerly towards the two men.
"Use your eyes, John Heywood, an' ye won't need to ask," said Jasper, with a quiet smile, as he carefully reloaded his gun.
"Ah! I see--a grey swan--no, surely, it cannot be a goose?" said Heywood, turning the bird over and regarding it with astonishment; "why, this is the biggest one I ever did see."
"What's yon in the water? Deer, I do believe," cried Jasper, quickly drawing the small shot from his gun and putting in a ball instead. "Come, lads, we shall have venison for supper to-night. That beast can't reach t'other side so soon as we can."
Jasper leaped quickly down the hill, and dashed through the bushes towards the spot where their canoe lay. He was closely followed by his companions, and in less than two minutes they were darting across the lake in their little Indian canoe, which was made of birch-bark, and was so light that one man could carry it easily.
While they are thus engaged I will introduce the reader to John Heywood. This individual was a youth of nineteen or twenty years of age, who was by profession a painter of landscapes and animals. He was tall and slender in person, with straight black hair, a pale haggard-looking face, an excitable nervous manner, and an enthusiastic temperament. Being adventurous in his disposition, he had left his father's home in Canada, and entreated his friend, Jasper Derry, to take him along with him into the wilderness. At first Jasper was very unwilling to agree to this request; because the young artist was utterly ignorant of everything connected with a life in the woods, and he could neither use a paddle nor a gun. But Heywood's father had done him some service at a time when he was ill and in difficulties, so, as the youth was very anxious to go, he resolved to repay this good turn of the father by doing a kindness to the son.
Heywood turned out but a poor backwoodsman, but he proved to be a pleasant, amusing companion, and as Jasper and the Indian were quite sufficient for the management of the light canoe, and the good gun of the former was more than sufficient to feed the party, it mattered nothing to Jasper that Heywood spent most of his time seated in the middle of the canoe, sketching the scenery as they went along. Still less did it matter that Heywood missed everything he fired at, whether it was close at hand or far away.
At first Jasper was disposed to look upon his young companion as a poor useless creature; and the Indian regarded him with undisguised contempt. But after they had been some time in his company, the opinions of these two men of the woods changed; for they found that the artist was wise, and well informed on many subjects of which they were extremely ignorant; and they beheld with deep admiration the beautiful and life-like drawings and paintings which he produced in rapid succession.
Such was the romantic youth who had, for the sake of seeing and painting the wilderness, joined himself to these rough sons of the forest, and who now sat in the centre of the canoe swaying his arms about and shouting with excitement as they quickly drew near to the swimming herd of deer.
"Keep yourself still," said Jasper, looking over his shoulder, "ye'll upset the canoe if ye go on like that."
"Give me the axe, give me the axe, I'll kill him!" cried Heywood.
"Take your pencil and draw him," observed the hunter, with a quiet laugh. "Now, Arrowhead, two good strokes of the paddle will do--there-- so."
As he spoke the canoe glanced up alongside of an affrighted deer, and in the twinkling of an eye Jasper's long knife was in its heart, and the water was dyed with blood. This happened quite near to the opposite shore of the lake, so that in little more than half an hour after it was killed the animal was cut up and packed, and the canoe was again speeding towards the upper end of the lake, where the party arrived just as night began to fling its dark mantle over the wilderness.
CHAPTER THREE.
THE ENCAMPMENT.
Camping out in the woods at night is truly a delightful thing, and the pleasantest part of it, perhaps, is the lighting of the fire. Light is agreeable to human eyes and cheering to the human heart. Solomon knew and felt that when he penned the words, "A pleasant thing it is for the eyes to behold the sun." And the rising of the sun is scarcely more grateful to the