Excerpt from The Camp on Poconnuck: A Story of the Connecticut Border

The boys released the porcupine, which quickly ran off into the forest. Then they lay down again. Beyond the circle of the fire the forest was darker than ever and save for the hoot-owls across the lake the night was still. It was a strange expe rience for them, this loneliness and mys tery of the woods. The night wind on the brow was like a mother's hand caressing fever. The fire was almost out, gleaming only in a few last embers. It was nearly mid night; they had fallen asleep at last, the long deep sleep of the woods. Suddenly a blood-curdling screech rang through the forest and a heavy animal leaped from a tree, landing with a thump that almost shook the ground, only a few feet from Harry's head. The boys sprang to their feet; they could not see anything but againand again they heard that screech, a wail ing, prolonged, agonized scream, as though a little child was being mangled. For a moment it would cease, then, in the dim dark forest, the silence of the night would be torn. The boys trembled and shook, there was no further sleep for them. Harry slipped a cartridge into his rifle and both waited and longed for the dawn. They rekindled the fire but did not venture into the black circle beyond it, though, as they looked around they noticed a piece of raw meat had disappeared which they had carelessly left.

In the morning the boys went down to see old J ohn Gilder who lived in a shanty at the foot of the mountain. They told him their story, said the screech sounded like a panther's. 'taint no panther but a wildcat, said J ohn. Them varmints comes over from Pine Cobble. The ledges around Baldwin's Mill is full on 'em. John Gilder was a character. A farmer let him live in his shanty on condition that he looked after the fences and salted his sheep. J ohn had a peculiar creed that if you took tobacco and whisky enough a rattlesnake wouldn't tech ye. In coldweather he went into winter quarters like the woodchucks. Save for the smoke curl ing from his chimney you would never sus pect that anyone lived in the shanty. He whittled out ax helves and made a few baskets for a living but was essentially an Esau, a man of the wild. The old hunter agreed to come up after breakfast with his dog and hunt the mountain over for the varmint. The boys were in high Spirits notwithstanding their loss of sleep. They felt safe with John. Old Whizzer, his fox hound, was one of the best dogs on the border of Litchfield and Dutchess counties. 80 they set out together. They had not hunted long, in fact, had hardly begun to climb the steep sides of Poconnuck, when old Whizzer broke out into a furious bay ing. A long-legged animal clearing ten feet at a jump went whacking down the pas ture, over the bushes and through the stub ble. 'tis a jack-rabbit, said Harry.

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