"I would have run away," said Lady Mary.

"If my uncle had let the wolf see that he was afraid of him, he would
have grown bolder, and have run after him and seized him. All animals are
afraid of brave men, but not of cowards. When the beast came too near, my
uncle faced him, and showed the bright axe, and the wolf then shrank back
a few paces. When my uncle got near the shore, he heard a long wild cry,
as if from twenty wolves at once. It might have been the echoes from the
islands that increased the sound; but it was very frightful, and made his
blood chill, for he knew that without his rifle he should stand a poor
chance against a large pack of hungry wolves. Just then a gun went off; he
heard the wolf give a terrible yell, he felt the whizzing of a bullet pass
him, and, turning about, saw the wolf lying dead on the ice. A loud shout
from the cedars in front told him from whom the shot came; it was my
father, who had been on the look-out on the lake shore, and he had fired
at and hit the wolf, when he saw that he could do so without hurting his
brother."

"Nurse, it would have been a sad thing if the gun had shot your uncle."

"It would; but my father was one of the best shots in the district, and
could hit a white spot on the bark of a tree at a great distance without
missing. It was an old Indian from Buckhorn Lake, who taught him to shoot
deer by torchlight, and to trap beavers."

"Well, I am glad that horrid wolf was killed, for wolves eat sheep and
lambs; and I dare say they would devour my little squirrel if they could
get him. Nurse, please to tell me again the name of the lake near which
you were born."