tory they
fall victims to a blizzard, and spend a most remarkable Christmas;
but, of course, all ends happily.

In the present story, summer is once more at hand, and again the boy
hunters venture forth, this time bound for a large lake a good many
miles from their home town. They have a jolly cruise on the water,
fall in with a very peculiar old hermit, and are molested not a
little by some rivals. They likewise follow up two bears, and are
treated to a ghost scare calculated to make anybody's hair stand on
end. What the ghost proved to be I leave the pages which follow
to reveal.

As I have said before, good hunting, especially in our eastern
states, is fast becoming a thing of the past. In some sections only
small game can be had and even then the eager hunter has to travel
many miles sometimes for a shot.

Trusting that all boys who love the woods and waters, a rod, a gun
and a restful camp will enjoy reading this volume, I remain,

Your sincere friend, Captain Ralph Bonehill.

CHAPTER I

FOUR LIVELY BOYS

"Boys, I'm going swimming. Who is going along?"

"Count me in, Snap," answered Shep Reed.

"Swimming?" came from a third youth of the crowd of four. "Why, you
couldn't keep me away if you tried. I've been waiting for a swim
for about eleven years-----"

"And a day," broke in a small, stout youth. "Don't forget the day,
Whopper, if you want to be really truthful.

"All right, put in the day," cheerfully assented the lad called
Whopper, because of his propensity to exaggerate when speaking. "Of
course you'll go, too, Giant?" he added, questioningly.

"Will I?" answered the small youth. "Will a duck swim and a cow eat
clover? To be sure I'll go. But I'll have to run home first and
tell mother."

"I'll have to go home, too," said the lad called Snap. "But I can be
back here in a quarter of an hour."

"Where shall we go?" asked Shep Reed.

"I was thinking of going up to Lane's Cove," answered Snap Dodge.

"Lane's Cove!" cried the smallest youth of the crowd.

"Yes. Isn't that a nice place?"

"Sure it is, but don't you know that Ham Spink's father has bought
all the land around there?"

"What of that, Giant?"

"Maybe he won't let us go swimming on his property---because of
the trouble we had with Ham."

"Oh, I don't believe he'll see us," came from the boy called Whopper.
"Why, I've been swimming at the cove a thousand times, and nobody
ever tried to stop me."

"If h