21. "You have come to your recollections too late, miser able old man!" cried Middleton; "the flames are within a quarter of a mile of us, and the wind is bringing them down in this quarter with dreadful rapidity."

22. "Anan! the flames! I care but little for the flames! If I only knew how to circumvent the cunning of the Tetons as I know how to cheat the fire of its prey, there would be nothing needed but thanks to the Lord for our deliverance. Do you call this a fire? If you had seen what I have witnessed in the eastern hills, when mighty mountains were like the furnace of a smith, you would have known what it was to fear the flames, and to be thankful that you were spared! Come, lads, come; 't is time to be doing now, and to cease talking; for yonder curling flame is truly coming on like a trotting moos^. Put hands upon this short and withered grass where e stand, and lay bare the 'arth."

23, "Would you think to deprive the fire of its victims in this childish manner?" exclaimed Middleton.

24. A faint but solemn smile passed over the features of the old man, as he answered- "Your gran'ther would have said, that when the enemy was nigh, a soldier could do no better than to obey."

25. The captain felt the reproof, and instantly began to im itate the industry of Paul, who was tearing the decayed herbage from the ground in a sort of desperate compliance with the trapper's direction. Even Ellen lent her hands to the labor, nor was it long before Inez was seen similarly employed, though none among them knew why or wherefore. When life is thought to be the reward of labor, men are wont to be industrious. A very few moments sufficed to lay bare a spot of some twenty feet in diameter.

26. Into one edge of this little area the trapper brought the females, directing Middleton and Paul to cover their light and inflammable dresses,with the blankets of the party. So soon as this preca ition was observed, the old man approached the opposite side of the grass, which still environed them in a tall

and dangerous circle, and selecting a handful of the driest of the herbage, he placed it over the pan of his rifle. The light combustible kindled at the flash. Then he placed the little flame into a bed of the standing fog, and, withdrawing from the spot to the center of the ring, he patiently awaited the result. 27. The subtle element seized with avidity upon its new fuel, and in a moment forked flames were gliding among the grass, as the tongues of ruminating animals are seen rolling among their food, apparently in quest of its sweetest portions.

28. "Now," said the old man, holding up a finger, and laughing in his peculiarly silent manner, "you shall see fire fight fire! Ah's me! many is the time I have burnt a smootly path from wanton laziness to pick my way across a tangled bottom."

29. "But is this not fatal ?" cried the amazed Middleton; "are you not bringing the enemy nigher to us instead of avoiding it?"

30. "Do you scorch so easily?-your gran'ther had a tougher skin. But we shall live to see; we shall all live to

31. The experience of the trapper was in the right. As the fire gained strength and heat, it began to spread on three sides, dying of itself on the fourth for want of aliment. As it increased, and the sullen roaring announced its power, it cleared every thing before it, leaving the black and smoking soil far more naked than if the scythe had swept the place. The situation of the fugitives would have still been hazardous, had not the area enlarged as the flame encircled them. But, by advancing to the spot where the trapper had kindled the grass, they avoided the heat, and, in a very few moments, the flames began to recede in every quarter, leaving them enveloped in a cloud of smoke, but perfectly safe from the torrent of fire that was still furiously rolling onward.

32. The spectators regarded the simple expedient of the trapper with that species of wonder, with which the courtiers of Ferdinand are said to have viewed the manner in which

Columbus made his egg to stand on its end, though with feelings that were filled with gratitude instead of envy.

33. "Most wonderful!" said Middleton, when he saw the complete success of the means, by which they had been rescued from a danger that he had conceived to be unavoida ble. "The thought was a gift from Heaven, and the hand that executed it, should be immortal.”

34. "Old trapper," cried Paul, thrusting his fingers through his shaggy locks, "I have lined many a loaded bee into his hole, and know something of the nature of the woods, but this is robbing a hornet of his sting without touching the insect!"

35. "It will do-it will do," returned the old man, who, after the first moment of his success, seemed to think no more of the exploit. "Let the flames do their work for a short half hour, and then we will mount. That time is needed to cool the meadow, for these unshod beasts are tender on the hoof as a barefooted girl."

36. The veteran, on whose experience they all so implicit ly relied for protection, employed himself in reconnoitering objects in the distance, through the openings' which the air occasionally made in the immense bodies of smoke, that, by this time, lay in enormous piles on every part of the plain.

And lay on the frosty ground-
"O, what shall the fate of the acorn be ?”
Was whispered all around,

By low toned voices, chiming sweet,

Like a floweret's bell when swung,

And grasshopper steeds were gathering fleet,
And the beetle's hoofs up-rung-

2.

3

4.

5

For the woodland Fays came sweeping past
In the pale autumnal ray,

Where the forest leaves were falling fast,
And the acorn quivering lay;

They came to tell what its fate should be,
Though life was unrevealed;

For life is holy mystery,

Where 'er it is concealed.

They came with gifts that should life bestow;
The dew and the living air,-

The bane that should work its deadly woe,--
Was found with the fairies there.

In the gray moss-cup was the mildew brought,
And the worm, in the rose-leaf rolled,
And many things with destruction fraught,
That its fate were quickly told.

But it needed not; for a blessed fate

Was the acorn's meant to be,—

The spirits of earth should its birth-time wait,
And watch o'er its destiny.

To a little sprite was the task assigned
To bury the acorn deep,

Away from the frost and searching wind,
When they through the forest sweep.

I laughed outright at the small thing's toil,
As bowed beneath the spade,

He balanced his gossamer wings the while
To look in the pit he made.

A thimble's depth it was scarcely deep,
When the spade aside he threw,

And rolled the acorn away to sleep

In the hush of dropping dew.

6. The Spring-time came with its fresh, warm air, And its gush of woodland song;

7.

8.

The dew came down, and the rain was there,
And the sunshine rested long;

Then softly the black earth turned aside,
The old leaf arching o'er,

Ard

up, where the last year's leaf was dried,
Came the acorn-shell once more.

With coiléd stem, and pale green hue,
It looked but a feeble thing;
Then deeply its roots abroad it threw,

Its strength from the earth to bring.
The woodland sprites are gathering round,
Rejoiced that the task is done-
That another life from the noisome ground
Is up to the pleasant sun.

The

young child passed with a careless tread,
And the germ had well-nigh crushed,
But a spider, launched on her airy thread,
The cheek of the stripling brushed.
He little knew, as he started back,

How the acorn's fate was hung

On the very point in the spider's track,
Where the web on his cheek was flung.

9. The Autumn came, and it stood alone,
And bowed as the wind passed by—
The wind that uttered its dirge-like moan
In the old oak sere and dry;

The hollow branches creaked and swayed,
But they bent not to the blast,

For the stout oak tree, where centuries played,
Was sturdy to the last.