There were tracks of a grouse in the snow,-
-blunt tracks that rested lightly on the soft whiteness, showing
that Nature remembered his necessity and had caused his new
snowshoes to grow famously. I hurried to the brook, a hundred
memories thronging over me of happy days and rare sights when the
wood folk revealed their little secrets. In the midst of
them--kwit! kwit! and with a thunder of wings a grouse whirred
away, wild and gray as the rare bird that lived there years
before. And when I questioned a hunter, he said: "That ol' beech
pa'tridge? Oh, yes, he's there. He'll stay there, too, till he
dies of old age; 'cause you see, Mister, there ain't nobody in
these parts spry enough to ketch 'im."
FOLLOWING THE DEER
I was camping one summer on a little lake--Deer Pond, the
natives called it--a few miles back from a quiet summer resort
on the Maine coast. Summer hotels and mackerel fishing and
noisy excursions had lost their semblance to a charm; so I
made a little tent, hired a canoe, and moved back into the
woods.
It was better here. The days, were still and long, and the nights
full of peace. The air was good, for nothing but the wild
creatures breathed it, and the firs had touched it with their
fragrance.
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