'Cats, you
know, have nine lives, and seldom are hurt, because they light on their
feet,' and I thought it was very cruel to laugh at me when I was in
pain. Beside, you called me 'puss,' and 'poor pussie' all the rest of
the _Bee_."

"I am sure, ma belle, I am very sorry if I was rude to you," said Louis,
trying to look penitent for the offence. "For my part, I had forgotten
all about the fall; I only know that we passed a very merry day. Dear
aunt made us a fine Johnny-cake for tea, with lots of maple molasses;
and the shed was a capital shed, and the cow must have thought us fine
builders, to have made such a comfortable shelter for her, with no
better help."

"After all," said Hector, thoughtfully; "children can do a great many
things if they only resolutely set to work, and use the wits and the
strength that God has given them to work with. A few weeks ago, and we
should have thought it utterly impossible to have supported ourselves
in a lonely wilderness like this by our own exertions in fishing and
hunting."

"If we had been lost in the forest, we must have died with hunger," said
Catharine; "but let us be thankful to the good God who led us hither,
and gave us health and strength to help ourselves."

CHAPTER IV.

"Aye from the sultry heat,
We to our cave retreat,
O'ercanopied by huge roots, intertwined,
Of wildest texture, blacken'd o'er with age,
Bound them their mantle green the climbers twine.
Beneath whose mantle--pale,
Fann'd by the breathing gale,
We shield us from the fervid mid-day rage,
Thither, while the murmuring throng
Of wild bees hum their drowsy song."--COLERIDGE.

"Louis, what are you cutting out of that bit of wood?" said Catharine,
the very next day after the first ideas of the shanty had been started.

"Hollowing out a canoe."

"Out of that piece of stick?" said Catharine, laughing. "How many
passengers is it to accommodate, my dear."

"Don't teaze, ma belle. I am only making a model. My canoe will be made
out of a big pine log, and large enough to hold three."

"Is it to be like the big sap-trough in the sugar-bush at home?" Louis
nodded assent.

"I long to go over to the island; I see lots of ducks popping in and
out of the little bays beneath the cedars, and there are plenty of
partridges, I am sure, and squirrels,--it is the very place for them."

"And shall we have a sail as well as oars?"

"Yes; set up your apron for a sail."

Catharine cas