Gaut Gurley

t lifts her b

winds fra

dreary sou

ars into

row than in anger. It was so in the present instance. Mr. Elwood had that day been abroad among the settlers, and, for the first time, learned not only that Gaut Gurley had moved with his family into the settlement, but that Claud was courting his daughter, and a match already settled on between them. On his return home, Elwood felt almost as much reluctance in making known his discoveries to his wife as Claud had before him; for he well knew how deeply they would disquiet her. But, soon concluding there would be no wisdom in attempting concealment, he told her what he had heard. As he had anticipated, the news fell like a sudden thunderclap on her heart. She had experienced, indeed, many strange misgivings respecting her son's late mysterious absences; but she was not prepared for such a double portion of ill-omened news as she deemed this to be, and it struck her mute with dismay, for it at once brought a c

been offered either by Mrs. Elwood or her husband on the n

length breaking the embarrassing silence, but without rais

" doubtfully asked Clau

eatly disturbs her mind,-more than is necessary, perhap

at, if his own secret was involved, as he supposed, the l

d that is not all; but the rest of it, which relates to a lately-formed

silent; and the last gleam of hope, which had for the moment lighted up the mother's countenance, faded like a moon-beam

ce of that wicked and dangerous man, Gaut Gurley. And with this object I came cheerfully, gladly. And when I reached this place, fondly hoping and believing we had escaped that man, and were forever secure from his wiles, I became happy,-happier than since I left my native hills in New-Hampshire. It soon became to me, lone and dreary as it

row trouble, it appears to me, Ali

onest purposes as father. But, were it otherwise, the daughter should not be held responsible for the fau

As to Gurley, I know not how, or why, he came here; nor do I wish or expect to have any

for the faults of her father, or even of assuming the ground that she has inherited any of his objectionable traits of character. I intend nothing of the kind, for I know nothing of her. But I do say, that, whenever she marries, she becomes the connecting link between her husband and her father, the ch

g task of replying, by the arrival of Philips, who, in his f

a few commonplace remarks had been exchanged,-

ked Mr. Elwood, in surprise a

er job for him in a day, which alone would take him perhaps weeks. These turn-outs we new settlers call 'bees.' Nothing is more common than for a man to get up a bee to knock off at on

but why do you say you came to as

ve a pretty stiff-looking burnt piece h

y,

y month's job for you and the yo

might get it all cleared and sown by the middle of September; which must be done, if I

is our main and almost only ch

get ready. I have been down the river to-day and engaged my seed wheat. To-morrow

not go a rod f

y n

n the settlement, large enough, we thin

en so kind as to st

y end of the lake, where he lives; and I have arranged matters a little in this section and on the river below. But, in justice, I should name, as the man who ha

oked sadly and meaningly from the husband to the son, both of whose c

ready, I came to notify you, so that you should not be taken by surprise. We propose to be on the ground, men and oxen, early day af

sion such a company

out that. You

od su

n me

flour, with fi

ll go up the lake, perhaps into the upper lake, and it will be a strange case if we don't return at night with fish, and I think flesh, enough to vi

e hard job of clearing off their land, were greatly gratified at the unexpected kindness. And even Mrs. Elwood, pained and annoyed as she was by the part taken by Gaut Gurley, whose only motive she believed was to gain some advantage for meditated evil, entered cheerfully into the affair, and joined her husband in handsome expr

gging bee. They had scarcely dispatched their breakfast, before the hunter, as he had promised, called for Claud; w

hillips, after they had reached the landing and deposit

s you know, but a learner in these sports," res

to that lake, where we will take a row of a few hours, and home again by nightfall. In these rapids, going or returning, we may safely count, at this season, on a plenty of trout; and, on t

the whole

many of the river or rapids, and as f

t largely for one

no time, and the rapids, which are the only drawback, can soon be surmounted, by oar or setting-pole, or, what may be cheapest, carrying the canoe round those most difficult of passage. Th

ize of the designed canoe. He then dries them thoroughly in the sun, after which he nicely scrapes and smooths off the outside. He next proceeds to soak these strips, which are thus made to go through a sort of tanning process, to render them tough and pliable, as well as to obviate their liability to crack by exposure to the sun. After the materials are thus prepared, he smooths off a level piece of ground, and drives around the outside a line of strong stakes, so that the space within shall describe the exact form of the boat in contemplation. Inside of these stakes he places and braces up the wet and pliable pieces of bark, beginning at the bottom and building up and bending into form the sides and ends, till the structure has attained the required height. In this situation it is left till it is again thoroughly dried and all the pieces become fixed in shape. A light inside framework is then constructed, resembling t

be standing in the edge of the water round the coves, to cool themselves and keep off the flies. Not seeing any signs of game, however, they steered out so as to clear the various little capes or woody points of land inclosing the numerous coves scattered along the indented shore, and struck a line for the great inlet a

r balance. The river, to be sure, is quite low, and the current, of course, at its feeblest point; but we shall find places enough within the next mile where the canoe, t

ise, as he cast his eye over the long reach of eddying, tumbling waters, that looked

in the bottom of the canoe, I should expect to succeed. And, as it i

ard, and sent the light craft like an arrow into the boiling eddies before him. And now, by sudden and powerful shoves, he was seen shooting obliquely up one rapid; tacking with the quickness of light, and darting off zigzag among the rocks and eddies towards another, which was in turn surmounted; while the boat was forced, surging and bounding forward, with increasing impetus, now up and now athwart the rushing currents, till he had gained a resting-place in the still water of some sheltering boulder in the stream, when he would mark off, with a rapid glance, another reach of falls, and shoot in among them as before. Thus, wit

e of a huge rock, on either side of which the divided stream rushed in two foam-covered torrents, with the force and swiftness of a mill-race; when they were startled by the shrill exclamations of a female voice, in tones indicative of surprise and alarm. The sounds, which came from some unseen point not far above them in the stream, were evidently drawing near at a rapid rate. Presently a small Indian canoe, with a single female occupant, whose

of herself," hurriedly exclaimed the hunter, seizing the impleme

air passed over her agitated countenance; for she saw herself rapidly drifting directly into the jaws of a wild and fearful labyrinth of breakers not fifty yards below, where, in all probability, her fragile canoe would be dashed to pieces, and herself thrown against the slippery and jagged rock, drawn down, and lost. Claud, who had witnessed, with trembling anxiety, the hunter's vain

he hunter, surprised and alarmed at the rash attempt of his young co

g against a high rock standing partly in the current. It was a moment of life or death, both to the man and maiden; for the boat was on the point of going broadside over the first fall into the wild and seething waters, seen leaping and roaring in whirlpools and jets of foam among the intricate passes of the ragged rocks below. Making sure of his grasp on the end of the canoe that had been thus fortunately thrown within his reach, the struggling Claud made an effort to draw it from the edge of the abyss into which it was about to be precipitated; but, with his most desperate exertions, he was bar

owing a grateful and admiring glance down upon her gallant rescuer; "le

the main current, out of it through a narrow side pass, down that and round the intervening rocks, and was now driving with main strength up another pass, abreast of the objects of his anxiety. "There: now seize the head of my can

securing his grasp on the hunter's boat, without losing his hold on the other; when, with one mighty

ully turning to the rescued girl, as the party stepped on to the dry beach, "I have

lingly. "O yes, know to remember, and know to remember, also,

I am ashamed not to have been the first in the r

e, "you have not told me who this stranger is, who seemed to mea

moved into the settlement; and they are now my nearest neighbors, at the foot of the lower lake. And to you, Claud, I have to say, that

e, she forbore to ask; and the latter, because he found it hard to realize that the fair-complexioned and every way beautiful girl, who stood before him, readily speaking his own language, and neatly and even richly arrayed in the usual female habiliments of the day, with t

not?" observed the hunter, perceiving their mut

y advanced, and extended his hand to his fair companion, who, with evident emoti

I-I-why, I can't thank him now; the words don'

calls you, that you have already expressed, and in the finest terms, far more

on to a rock, up here at the head of the falls, and threw into an eddy below, till I had taken a supply. But, like other folks, I must have the one more,-a large one I had seen playing round my hook; and, in my eagerness to take him, I did not notice that my canoe had slipped off the

e ones, too. Claud shall remain here while I go a piece up the lake for a deer, and follow your example, except the race down the rapids; but that he ca

ake above, then not more than sixty or seventy rods distant. In a short time the proposed landing was reached, and the boat let down into the water. The maiden, with an easy and sprightly movement, then flung herself into her seat, and, with a paddle hastily whittled for her out of a piece of drift-wood, by the ever ready hunter, sent he

racefully bowing with the lightly-dipping oar, was receding from his rapt view, and gradually melting away in th

ed to have fallen at the departure of his fair favorite; "it is even so; but, for all that, the very flowe

ly-turned English features, and

s the old chief once told me, somewhere away back among the gone-by generations, a female ancestor, a pure white woman, who was made captive by the Indians, and married into their tribe, and who was as hand

, draw different con

appear, and so will frequently leap out in a child four or five generations off; a complete copy, in looks, blood, and character, of the original (as far as can be judged from family tradition), who may have been dead an hundred years. This is my notion; and I hold that every person is destined to be at least once reproduced among some of his des

igence and culture of this remarkable girl. To appear and converse as she does, she must

ily. Well, the short of the matter is, that they persuaded the chief to leave her through the winter; and, she becoming a favorite with them all, they instructed her, sent her to school, and dressed her as they would an own daughter, and would only part with her in the spring on condition of her returning in

ted with this Indian family, a

an old man, he claims to have been a direct descendant of Paugus,-a grandson, I believe, of that noted chief,-who was slain in Lovewell's bloody fight, and whose tribe, once known as the Sokokis or Saco Indians, who were great fighters, it is said, were then forever broken up, the most of them fleeing over the British highlands and joining the St. Francis Indians in Canada. The family of Paugus, however, with a few of the head men, who survived the battle, concluded to remain this side of the mountain, and try to keep up a show of the tribe on these la

dapting his mode of fishing to the locality and season, Claud made his way along down the edge of the stream to a designated point, a short distance above the place where, on the occurrence of the incident before described, they had ceased to ascend the rapids in their canoes. He here found, as he had been told, below a traversing reach of bare breakers, a large, deep eddy of gently revolving water, in the centre of which lay tossing on the swell a broad spiral wreath of spotless foam. The hunter, in selecting these rapids, an

, and more than he needed. But still he could not forego his exciting employment, and, insensible of the lapse of time, continued his drafts on the seemingly inexhaustible eddy, till roused by the long, shrill halloo of the returned hunter, summoning him to the landing above. Throwing down his pole by the side of his proud display of fish, he hastened up to the lake, where he found the hunter complacently employed in removing, for lightness of carriage, the head and offal of a noble fat buck; when the two, with mutual congratulations on their success, took up canoe, and, with a stop only long enough to take in the trout, carried and launched their richly-freighted craft at a convenient place in the stream below. Seeing Claud securely seated in the bottom of t