s, raccoons, woodchucks, and chipmunks were snugly
"holed up," and sleeping away the great white cold. The deer and moose
were in their well-trodden "yards," for the snow was deep. The
travellers knew that there were plenty of wood-mice astir,--that if
there had been light enough they would have seen their delicate trails
wandering everywhere among the trees. But the jangling of the
sled-bells was enough to keep all shy beasts at a distance. Only the
porcupine was quite undaunted by the strange sounds. One came out into
the middle of the road, and stood there seemingly to dispute passage.
The boy, in whom primal instincts were still dominant, was for getting
out and killing the insolent little bristler. But the father turned
the team aside, and gracefully yielded the road, saying:

"Let him be, son! The woods is hisn as much as ourn. An' I respect
him, fer he ain't skeered of nothin' that goes on legs!"

An hour later, when the boy was getting very drowsy from watching the
ceaseless procession of dark fir-trees, his father nudged him, and
whispered, "Look!" The boy, wide awake on the instant, peered into the
gloom, and presently his trained young eyes made out a shadowy,
slouching form, that flitted without a sound from tree to tree.

"Lucivee?" he asked, breathless with interest, laying his mittened
hand on his little rifle under the blankets.

"Yes, lucivee! lynx!" answered the father.

"Let me take a shot at him," said the boy, removing the mitten from
his right hand, and bringing out his weapon.

"Oh, what's the good o' killin' the beast Christmas times!" protested
the father, gently. And the boy laid down the gun.

"What does he think he's follerin' us fer?" he inquired, a moment
later.

"The moose-meat, maybe!" replied the man. "He smells it likely, an'
thinks we're goin' to give it to him for a Christmas present!"

At this suggestion the boy laughed out loud. His clear young voice
rang through the frosty shadows; and the lynx, surprised and
offended, shrank back, and slunk away in another direction.

"Bloodthirsty varmints, them lucivees!" said the boy, who wanted a
lynx-skin as a trophy. "Ain't it better to shoot 'em whenever one gits
the chance?"

"Well," said the father, dubiously, "maybe so! But there's better
times fer killin' than Christmas times!"

A little farther ahead, the road to Brine's Brook turned off. Here the
going was very heavy. The road was little travelled, and in places
almost