of all parties, who were by this time sufficiently
hungry, having eaten nothing since the previous evening more substantial
than the strawberries they had taken during the time they were gathering
them in the morning.

Catharine had selected a pretty, cool, shady recess, a natural bower,
under the overhanging growth of cedars, poplars, and birch, which were
wreathed together by the flexile branches of the vine and bitter-sweet,
which climbed to a height of fifteen feet _[FN: Solatnum
dulcamara,--Bitter-sweet or Woody nightshade. This plant, like the
red-berried briony of England, is highly ornamental. It possesses
powerful properties as a medicine, and is in high reputation among the
Indians.]_ among the branches _[Illustration: THE FIRST BREAKFAST]_ of
the trees, which it covered as with a mantle. A pure spring of cold,
delicious water welled out from beneath the twisted roots of an old
hoary-barked cedar, and found its way among the shingles on the beach
to the lake, a humble but constant tributary to its waters. Some large
blocks of water-worn stone formed convenient seats and a natural table,
on which the little maiden arranged the forest fare; and never was a
meal made with greater appetite or taken with more thankfulness than
that which our wanderers ate that morning. The eggs (part of which they
reserved for another time) were declared to be better than those that
were daily produced from the little hen-house at Cold Springs. The
strawberries, set out in little pottles made with the shining leaves of
the oak, ingeniously pinned together by Catharine with the long spurs
of the hawthorn, _[FN: The long-spurred American hawthorn may be
observed by our young readers among that beautiful collection of the
hawthorn family and its affinities, which flourish on the north side
of Kensington Gardens.]_ were voted delicious, and the pure water most
refreshing, that they drank, for lack of better cups, from a large
mussel-shell which Catharine had picked up among the weeds and pebbles
on the beach.

Many children would have wandered about weeping and disconsolate,
lamenting their sad fate, or have embittered the time by useless
repining, or, perhaps, by venting their uneasiness in reviling the
principal author of their calamity--poor, thoughtless Louis; but such
were not the dispositions of our young Canadians. Early accustomed to
the hardships incidental to the lives of the settlers in the bush,
these young people had le