After proceeding a mile and three quarters below the mouth of the
Lobster, we reached, about sundown, a small island at the head of
what Joe called the Moosehorn Dead-water, (the Moosehorn, in which
he was going to hunt that night, coming in about three miles below),
and on the upper end of this we decided to camp. On a point at the
lower end lay the carcass of a moose killed a month or more before.
We concluded merely to prepare our camp, and leave our baggage here,
that all might be ready when we returned from moose-hunting. Though
I had not come a-hunting, and felt some compunctions about
accompanying the hunters, I wished to see a moose near at hand, and
was not sorry to learn how the Indian managed to kill one. I went as
reporter or chaplain to the hunters,--and the chaplain has been
known to carry a gun himself. After clearing a small space amid the
dense spruce and fir trees, we covered the damp ground with a
shingling of fir-twigs, and, while Joe was preparing his birch-horn
and pitching his canoe,--for this had to be done whenever we stopped
long enough to build a fire, and was the principal labor which he
took upon himself at such times,--we collected fuel for the night,
large wet and rotting logs, which had lodged at the head of the
island, for our hatchet was too small for effective chopping; but we
did not kindle a fire, lest the moose should smell it. Joe set up a
couple of forked stakes, and prepared half a dozen poles, ready to
cast one of our blankets over in case it rained in the night, which
precaution, however, was omitted the next night. We also plucked the
ducks which had been killed for breakfast.

While we were thus engaged in the twilight, we heard faintly,
from far down the stream, what sounded like two strokes of a
woodchopper's axe, echoing dully through the grim solitude. We are