in the rain, to a favorite camping ground on a smaller lake, where we
had the wilderness all to ourselves.

The rain was still falling, and the lake white-capped, and the forest
all misty and wind-blown when we ran our canoes ashore by the old
cedar that marked our landing place. First we built a big fire to
dry some boughs to sleep upon; then we built our houses, Simmo a
bark _commoosie_, and I a little tent; and I was inside, getting
dry clothes out of a rubber bag, when I heard a white-throated
sparrow calling cheerily his Indian name, _O hear, sweet
Killooleet-lillooleet-lillooleet!_ And the sound was so sunny, so good
to hear in the steady drip of rain on the roof, that I went out to see
the little fellow who had bid us welcome to the wilderness.

Simmo had heard too. He was on his hands and knees, just his dark face
peering by the corner stake of his _commoosie_, so as to see better
the little singer on my tent.--"Have better weather and better luck
now. Killooleet sing on ridgepole," he said confidently. Then we
spread some cracker crumbs for the guest and turned in to sleep till
better times.

That was the beginning of a long acquaintance. It was also the first
of many social calls from a whole colony of white-throats (Tom-Peabody
birds) that lived on the mountain-side just behind my tent, and that
came one by one to sing to us, and to get acquainted, and to share our
crumbs. Sometimes, too, in rainy weather, when the woods seemed wetter
than the lake, and Simmo would be sleeping philosophically, and I
reading, or tying trout flies in the tent, I would hear a gentle stir
and a rustle or two just outside, under the tent fly. Then, if I crept
out quietly, I would find Killooleet exploring my goods to find where