he had arranged a sort of citadel, to
which he and his family could retire in case of attack from savages.
One peak of this mountainette rose in naked grandeur to a height of
about fifty feet above the lake. Elsewhere the islet was wooded to the
water's edge with spruce and birch-trees, in some places fringed with
willows. On a few open patches were multitudes of ripe berries, which
here and there seemed literally to cover the ground with a carpet of
bright red.

On the open ground, or lawn, beside the cove, stood the hunter's hut, a
small structure of rounded logs, with a door, on either side of which
was a window. From those glassless windows there was a view of lake and
isles and distant woods, with purple mountains beyond, which formed a
scene of indescribable beauty. Close to the door, forming, as it were,
a porch to it, there stood a semi-circular erection of poles covered
with birch-bark and deerskins, in front of which blazed the household
fire, with a tripod over it, and a bubbling earthen pot hanging
therefrom. Around the inner side of the fire, under the semi-circular
tent, were spread a number of deerskins to serve as couches. On one of
these sat an Indian woman, with the family babe in her arms.

It was a wonderful babe! and obviously a wise one, for it knew its own
father directly, stretched out its little arms, and shouted for instant
recognition. Nor had it to shout long, for Hendrick, being fond of it
and regardless of appearances, seized it in his arms and smothered it in
his beard, out of which retreat crows and squalls of satisfaction
thereafter issued.

"Excuse me, friends," said Hendrick at last, delivering the child to its
mother. "I have been absent on a visit to my wife's relations, and have
not seen little Ian for a long time. Sit down, and we will see what
cheer the pot contains. I don't ask you to enter the hut, because while
the weather is mild it is pleasanter outside. When winter comes we make
more use of the house. My wife, you see, does not like it, having been
accustomed to tents all her life."

"But me--I--likes it when the snow fall," said Trueheart, looking up
with a bright smile from the pot, into which she had previously been
making investigations.

"True--true. I think you like whatever I like; at least you try to!"
returned the hunter, as he sat down and began to tie the feathers on the
head of an arrow. "You even try to speak good grammar for my sake!"

Tru