The Big Otter by R. M. Ballantyne (best novels ever .txt) 📕
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- Author: R. M. Ballantyne
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Well do I remember my dear old father’s last advice to me on this subject. “Punch,” said he, “wherever you go, my boy, ‘remember the Sabbath-day to keep it holy.’ You’ll be tempted to do ordinary work, and to go in for ordinary amusement on that day, but don’t do it, my boy—don’t do it. Depend upon it, a blessing always attends the respecter of the Sabbath.”
“But, father,” said I, venturing for the first time in my life to echo what I had often heard said, “is it true, as some people assert, that the Sabbath is a Jewish institution, and no longer binding on Christians? Pardon my venturing to repeat this objection—”
“Objection!” interrupted my father, “why, dear boy, there’s nothing I like better than to hear fair, honest objections, because then I can meet them. How can the Sabbath be a Jewish institution when the commandment begins with ‘remember’? The day to be remembered was instituted at Creation, given to man as a blessed day of rest from toil, and recognised as binding by our Saviour, when He sanctioned works of necessity and mercy on that day.”
I never forgot my father’s advice on this subject, and have experienced mental, physical, and spiritual benefit as the result.
Owing to our belief in the Sabbath, then, we invariably, while travelling, remained in camp on that clay, and found that we not only did not lose, but actually had gained in speed at the end of each week—comparing our rate of progress with that of those who did not rest on Sundays. And I now recall to mind a certain bishop of the Church of England who, while travelling in the great Nor’-west between two well-known stations, made the fastest journey on record, although he regularly remained in camp on the Sabbath-day. On that day, also, after our arrival at Lake Wichikagan, and all through the winter, Lumley made a regular practice of assembling the men and reading a sermon from a book which he had brought for the purpose. And he did not neglect instruction of another kind, to which I shall refer as well as to our winter amusements, in the proper place.
During all this time our larder had been well supplied by Blondin with fresh fish from the lake, and by the Indians with haunches of reindeer and moose, or elk, venison. They also brought us beaver-meat, the tails of which were considered the best portions. Bear’s-meat was offered us, but we did not relish it much, possibly from prejudice; but we would have been glad of it, doubtless, if reduced to short allowance. Of course wild-fowl of all kinds were plentiful, and many of these were shot by Lumley and myself, as well as by our men.
Some of the geese we had at first salted, but, the frost having come, we were by that time able to preserve fish and meat quite fresh for winter use—so that both net and gun were in constant occupation.
One day, while Lumley and I were sitting at dinner—which we usually took about noon—we were agreeably surprised by the appearance of a strange Indian, and still more agreeably surprised by his entering the hall and holding out a packet to Lumley. Having delivered it, the man, who looked wayworn, strode to the fire, sat quietly down and began to smoke a pipe which I had handed to him ready charged.
“Why, what’s this?” exclaimed Lumley, unwrapping the covering of the packet, “not a letter, surely!—yes, I declare it is—and from Macnab too. Come, this is an unlooked-for treat.”
I was quite excited—indeed we both were—for a letter in those regions was about as rare as snow in July.
Lumley opened it hastily and read as follows:—
“My dear Lumley, you will be surprised to get a letter from me, and dated, too, from an unknown post. Yes, my boy, like yourself, I have been transferred from my old home, to this region, which is not more than two hundred miles from your present residence. The governor sent me to establish it soon after you left. I have named it the Mountain House, because there’s a thing the shape and size of a sugar-loaf behind it. So, I’ll hope to look you up during the winter. Before going further let me give you a piece of news—I’ve got my sister out here to stay with me! Just think of that!”
At this point Lumley laid down the letter and stared at me.
“Why, Max, such a thing was never heard of before! If he had got a wife, now, I could have understood it, but a sister!”
“Well, whatever she is to him, she’s a civilised white woman, and that’s a sight worth seeing in those regions. I wonder what she’s like?” said I.
“Like himself, of course. Tall, raw-boned, square-shouldered, red-haired (you know he told us she was red-haired), square-jawed, Roman-nosed—a Macnab female could be nothing else.”
“Come,” said I, “don’t be impolite to Highland females, but go on with the letter.”
Lumley obeyed, but the letter contained little more of interest. We cared not for that, however. We had now a subject capable of keeping us in speculative talk for a week—the mere fact that there was actually a civilised woman—a lady perhaps—at all events a Macnab—within two hundred miles of us!
“No doubt she’s a rugged specimen of the sex,” said Lumley, as we sat beside the fire that night, “no other kind of white female would venture to face this wilderness for the sake of a brother; but she is a white woman, and she is only two hundred miles off—unless our friend is joking—and she’s Macnab’s sister—Jessie, if I remember rightly—
“‘Stalwart young Jessie,
The flower of—’”
“Come, Lumley, that will do—good-night!”
At last winter came upon us in earnest. It had been threatening for a considerable time. Sharp frosts had occurred during the nights, and more than once we had on rising found thin ice forming on the lake, though the motion of the running water had as yet prevented our stream from freezing; but towards the end of October there came a day which completely changed the condition and appearance of things.
Every one knows the peculiar, I may say the exhilarating, sensations that are experienced when one looks out from one’s window and beholds the landscape covered completely with the first snows of winter.
Well, those sensations were experienced on the occasion of which I write in somewhat peculiar circumstances. Lumley and I were out hunting at the time: we had been successful; and, having wandered far from the fort, resolved to encamp in the woods, and return home early in the morning.
“I do love to bivouac in the forest,” I said, as we busied ourselves spreading brush-wood on the ground, preparing the kettle, plucking our game, and kindling the fire, “especially at this season of the year, when the sharp nights render the fire so agreeable.”
“Yes,” said Lumley, “and the sharp appetites render food so delightful.”
“To say nothing,” I added, “of the sharp wits that render intercourse so pleasant.”
“Ah, and not to mention,” retorted Lumley, “the dull wits, stirred into unwonted activity, which tone down that intercourse with flashes of weakly humour. Now then, Max, clap on more wood. Don’t spare the firing—there’s plenty of it, so—isn’t it grand to see the thick smoke towering upwards straight and solid like a pillar!”
“Seldom that one experiences a calm so perfect,” said I, glancing upward at the slowly-rising smoke. “Don’t you think it is the proverbial calm before the storm?”
“Don’t know, Max. I’m not weather-wise. Can’t say that I understand much about calms or storms, proverbial or otherwise, and don’t much care.”
“That’s not like your usual philosophical character, Lumley,” said I—“see, the column is still quite perpendicular—”
“Come, Max,” interrupted my friend, “don’t get sentimental till after supper. Go to work, and pluck that bird while I fill the kettle.”
“If anything can drive away sentiment,” I replied, taking up one of the birds which we had shot that day, “the plucking and cleaning of this will do it.”
“On the contrary, man,” returned Lumley, taking up the tin kettle as he spoke, “true sentiment, if you had it, would induce you to moralise on that bird as you plucked it—on the romantic commencement of its career amid the reeds and sedges of the swamps in the great Nor’-west; on the bold flights of its maturer years over the northern wilderness into those mysterious regions round the pole, which man, with all his vaunted power and wisdom, has failed to fathom, and on the sad—I may even say inglorious—termination of its course in a hunter’s pot, to say nothing of a hunter’s stom—”
“Lumley,” said I, interrupting, “do try to hold your tongue, if you can, and go fill your kettle.”
With a laugh he swung off to a spring that bubbled at the foot of a rock hard by, and when he returned I had my bird plucked, singed, split open, and cleaned out. You must understand, reader, that we were not particular. We were wont to grasp the feathers in large handfuls, and such as would not come off easily we singed off.
“You see, Lumley,” said I, when he came back, “I don’t intend that this bird shall end his career in the pot. I’ll roast him.”
“’Tis well, most noble Max, for I wouldn’t let you pot him, even if you wished to. We have only one kettle, and that must be devoted to tea.”
It was not long before the supper was ready. While it was preparing Lumley and I sat chatting by the fire, and gazing in a sort of dreamy delight at the glorious view of land and water which we could see through an opening among the trees in front of us; for, not only was there the rich colouring of autumn everywhere—the greens, yellows, browns, and reds of mosses, grasses, and variegated foliage—but there was a bright golden glow cast over all by the beams of the setting sun.
Ere long all this was forgotten as we lay under the starry sky in profound slumber.
While we slept, the Creator was preparing that wonderful and beautiful change to which I have referred. Clouds gradually overspread the sky—I observed this when, in a half-sleeping state I rose to mend our fire, but thought nothing of it. I did not, however, observe what followed, for sleep had overpowered me again the instant I lay down.
Softly, silently, persistently, and in large flakes, the snow must have fallen during the entire night, for, when we awoke it lay half a foot deep upon us, and when we shook ourselves free and looked forth we found that the whole landscape, far and near, was covered with the same pure white drapery. The uniformity of the scene was broken by the knolls of trees and shrubs and belts of forest which showed powerfully against the white ground, and by the water of the numerous ponds and lakes and streams which, where calm, reflected the bright blue sky, and, where rough, sparkled in the rising sun; while every twig and leaf of bush and tree bore its little fringe or patch of snow, so that we were surrounded by the most beautiful and complicated forms of lacework conceivable of Nature’s own making.
“It is glorious to look at,” said Lumley, after our first burst of enthusiasm, “but it will be troublesome to walk through, I fear.”
We did not, however, find it as troublesome as we had expected; for, although nearly a foot deep, the snow was quite dry, owing to the frost which had set in, and we could drive it aside with comparative ease when we started on our journey homeward.
Arrived at the fort we found our men and the few Indians who
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