season, Richard, however, boasted for many a year of his shot with the
“cricket;” and Benjamin gravely asserted that he thought they had
killed nearly as many pigeons on that day as there were Frenchmen
destroyed on the memorable occasion of Rodney’s victory.




CHAPTER XXIII.



“Help, masters, help; here’s a fish hangs in the net, like a poor
Man’s right in the law.’—Pericles of Tyre.

The advance of the season now became as rapid as its first approach
had been tedious and lingering. The days were uniformly mild, while
the nights, though cool, were no longer chilled by frosts. The whip-
poor-will was heard whistling his melancholy notes along the margin of
the lake, and the ponds and meadows were sending forth the music of
their thousand tenants. The leaf of the native poplar was seen
quivering in the woods; the sides of the mountains began to lose their
hue of brown, as the lively green of the different members of the
forest blended their shades with the permanent colors of the pine and
hemlock; and even the buds of the tardy oak were swelling with the
promise of the coming summer. The gay and fluttering blue-bird, the
social robin, and the industrious little wren were all to be seen
enlivening the fields with their presence and their songs; while the
soaring fish-hawk was already hovering over the waters of the Otsego,
watching with native voracity for the appearance of his prey.