is
little ones shouted at their play as merrily as though New York or
Boston were within a stone's throw. To be sure, the children were bidden
never to stray far from home, especially at nightfall; and the crack of
rifles ringing now and then through the forest paled their cheeks for
an instant, as the thought of some shaggy bear, furious in his death
agony, crossed their minds.

Sometimes, too, the children would whisper together of the fate of poor
Annie Green, who, a few years before had been found killed in the
forest; or their mother would tell them with pale lips of the night when
their father and neighbor Freeman encountered two painted Indians near
the cabin. The tomahawk of the Indian who tried to kill their father was
still hanging upon the cabin wall.

But all this had happened twelve years earlier--before Bessie, the
oldest girl, was born--and seemed to the children's minds like a bit of
ancient history--almost as far off as the exploits of Hannibal or Julius
Caesar appear to us. So, as I have said, the girls and boys of the
settlement shouted joyously at their play, or ran in merry groups to the
rough log hut, called "The School-House," little dreaming of the cares
and anxieties of their elders.

Bessie Hedden was a merry-hearted creature, and so pretty that, had she
been an Indian maiden, she would have been known as "Wild Rose," or
"Singing Bird," or "Water Lily," or some such name. As it was, many of
the villagers called her "Little Sunshine," for her joyous spirit could
light up the darkest corner. She was faithful at school, affectionate
and industrious at home, and joyous and honorable among her playmates.
What wonder, then, that everybody loved her, or that she was happiest
among the happy? Her brother Rudolph was much younger than she,--a
rosy-checked, strong-armed little urchin of seven years; and Kitty, the
youngest of the Hedden children, was but three years of age at the date
at which my story opens.

There was one other individual belonging to the family circle, larger
even than Bessie, stronger and saucier even than Rudolph, and but little
older than Kitty. He had no hands, yet once did, as all admitted, the
best day's work ever performed by any member of the family. This
individual's name was Bouncer, and he had a way of walking about on
all-fours, and barking--probably in consequence of his having been
created a dog.

Bouncer loved all the children dearly; but, stout-hearted fellow tha