he sugar bush and unlimited taffy to care
very much, however, and went dancing along over the ghostly patches of
snow and through the weird, shifting mists, his tongue keeping pace
with his feet.

"Don't you wish there was tagers and lions in the bush here, Uncle? I
bet I'd shoot them if there was. Sandy says there's lions down in the
river bed, but I bet he jist said that to see if I'd get scared. He
can't scare me, though. What kind of a noise does a lion make. Uncle
Dune? Listen, do you hear that funny noise ahead?" He drew closer to
his uncle. "Is that the kind of a noise a lion makes?"

"It will jist be the river you hear, child," said Duncan reassuringly.

"No, I don't mean that squashy noise; it's that bangin' sound," he
insisted anxiously. "Listen!"

They stood still, the child holding the man's fingers, and above the
sighing of the bare treetops and the rushing of the river there came
the sound of dull, booming thuds.

"We will jist see," said Duncan, striving to hide his apprehension.
They hurried through the underbrush towards the river, where a few
cedar clumps overhung its edge. Duncan seized one and, leaning over,
looked down into the dark ravine. The pale moonlight touched the water
and revealed the cause of the unusual sounds. Strange dark forms were
hurrying along its glinting surface. Down the foaming tide they came,
shooting past, swift and stealthy. As far up the river as Duncan's eye
could pierce still they appeared, whirling silently forward. But
farther down was a sight that made the old man's heart stand still. A
few yards below him, and just at the turn in the river above the
village were the "Narrows," where the most careful navigation of logs
was necessary to prevent a jam. And there, wedged in the narrow
channel, hurled together into fantastic shapes and augmented each
moment by the oncoming logs which struck the heap with a resounding
boom, was piled a wild jumbled mass of timber!

Like most of the early settlers of Glenoro, Duncan was an experienced
river-driver, and instantly realised the gravity of the situation. If
the jam of logs were permitted long to impede the progress of the river
in its high, swollen condition, there would be a disastrous flood in
the village. In a flash there passed before his mind a picture of the
havoc it would cause,--death and destruction swift and certain upon the
unwarned inhabitants, men and women hurried into Eternity unprepared!