his neighbor, the lubberly porcupine, clambers up, seats himself upon a branching cypress and gnaws the bark. He views the eager huntsman with a careless and indifferent air, unconscious that his tender flesh is regarded as a most delicious morsel. The industrious beaver, like a wary sentinel, warns his family of man's approach by striking the water with his tail. The muskrat, or musquash, plunges immediately into the water. The otter quits his sports an( slides upon his belly among the reeds - the timid squirrel leaps from bough to bough, until it reaches the topmost shade of the cypress; the marten jumps from tree to tree, and buries itself in the foliage - the whistler" and weasel repair to their respective domiciles- a precipitous flight alone saves the fox his rich silvery pelisse - the badger, or ground-hog, too remote from his dwelling, digs the sandy soil and buries himself alive, to avoid pursuit - his magnificent skin is destined to adorn the loins of an Indian - it requires the joint efforts of two men to force"' him from his hiding place, and to kill him.
The evening previous to our egression from the blind mazes of this tangled wood, our eyes were recreated by a wishing scene. When it presents itself after a disastrous combat, the spectacle consoles the afflicted heart of the savage warrior. From the mountain's top we contemplated the " dance of the manitous or spirits, and the glorious entrance of departed champions into the country of souls." Vast columns of light varying in splendor appeared to divert and balance themselves in the heavens---same of perpendicular form; others resembling undulatory waves; now concealing, now exhibiting themselves under diversified aspects until the entire hemisphere seemed brilliantly illuminated. All these masses united at the zenith, and then separated under a variety of forms.
Is Siffieur; elsewhere defined as " a species of mountain's 16 Fr. arracher.