its flesh was known to be extremely
unsavoury, and none of them cared to eat it. Marengo, however, had no
such scruples, and he was wont to make several hearty meals each day
upon the rejected burbot.

A fish diet exclusively was not the thing; and as our party soon grew
tired of it, the hunter Basil shouldered his rifle, and strode off into
the woods in search of game. The others remained working upon the
cabin, which was still far from being finished.

Basil kept along the edge of the lake in an easterly direction. He had
not gone more than a quarter of a mile, when he came upon a dry gravelly
ridge, which was thickly covered with a species of pine-trees that
resembled the Scotch fir (_Pinus sylvestris_). These trees were not
over forty feet in height, with very thick trunks and long flexible
branches. No other trees grew among them, for it is the nature of this
pine--which was the "scrub" or grey pine (_Pinus Banksiana)_ to
monopolise the ground wherever it grows. As Basil passed on, he noticed
that many of the trees were completely "barked," particularly on the
branches; and small pieces of the bark lay scattered over the ground, as
though it had been peeled off and gnawed by some animal. He was walking
quietly on and thinking what creature could have made such a wreck, when
he came to a place where the ground was covered with fine sand or dust.
In this, to his astonishment, he observed what he supposed to be the
tracks of human feet! They were not those of a man, but small tracks,
resembling the footsteps of a child of three or four years of age. He
was about stooping down to examine them more closely, when a voice
sounded in his ears exactly like the cry of a child! This brought him
suddenly to an erect attitude again, and he looked all round to discover
who or what had uttered that strange cry. He could see no one--child or
man--and strange, too, for he had a clear view through the tree-trunks
for several hundred yards around. He was filled with curiosity, not
unmixed with alarm; and, stepping forward a few paces, he was about to
bend down and examine the tracks a second time, when the singular cry
again startled him. This time it was louder than before, as if he was
closer to whatever had uttered it, but Basil now perceived that it
proceeded from above him. The creature from which it came was certainly
not upon the ground, but high up among the tops of the trees. He looked
up, and there, in the f