So getting out the two fox traps Rolf set to work. Noting where chiefly the foxes ran or played he chose two beaten pathways and hid the traps carefully, exactly as he did for the marten; then selecting a couple of small cedar branches he cut these and laid them across the path, one on each side of the trap, assuming that the foxes following the usual route would leap over the boughs and land in disaster. To make doubly sure he put a piece of meat by each trap and half-way between them set a large piece on a stone.
Then he sprinkled fresh earth over the pathways and around each trap and bait so he should have a record of the tracks.
Foxes came that night, as he learned by the footprints along the beach, but never one went near his traps. He studied the marks; they slowly told him all the main facts. The foxes had come as usual, and frolicked about. They had discovered the bait and the traps at once — how could such sharp noses miss them — and as quickly noted that the traps were suspicious-smelling iron things, that manscent, hand, foot, and body, were very evident all about; that the only inducement to go forward was some meat which was coarse and cold, not for a moment to be compared with the hot juicy mouse meat that abounded in every meadow. The foxes were well fed and unhungry. Why should they venture into such evident danger? In a word, walls of stone could not have more completely protected the ground and the meat from the foxes than did the obvious nature of the traps; not a track was near, and many afar showed how quickly they had veered off.
“Ugh, it is always so,” said Quonab. “Will you try again?”
“Yes, I will,” replied Rolf, remembering now that he had omitted to deodorize his traps and his boots.
He made a fire of cedar and smoked his traps, chains, and all. Then taking a piece of raw venison he rubbed it on his leather gloves and on the soles of his boots, wondering how he had expected to succeed the night before with all these man-scent killers left out. He put fine, soft moss under the pan of each trap, then removed the cedar brush, and gently sprinkled all with fine, dry earth. The set was perfect; no human eye could have told that there was any trap in the place. It seemed a foregone success.
“Fox don’t go by eye,” was all the Indian said, for he reckoned it best to let the learner work it out.
In the morning Rolf was up eager to see the results. There was nothing at all. A fox had indeed, come within ten feet at one place, but behaved then as though positively amused at the childishness of the whole smelly affair. Had a man been there on guard with a club, he could not have kept the spot more wholly clear of foxes. Rolf turned away baffled and utterly puzzled. He had not gone far before he heard a most terrific yelping from Skookum, and turned to see that trouble-seeking pup caught by the leg in the first trap. It was more the horrible surprise than the pain, but he did howl.
The hunters came quickly to the rescue and at once he was freed, none the worse, for the traps have no teeth; they merely hold. It is the long struggle and the starvation chiefly that are cruel, and these every trapper should cut short by going often around his line.
Now Quonab took part. “That is a good setting for some things. It would catch a coon, a mink, or a marten, — or a dog — but not a fox or a wolf. They are very clever. You shall see.”
The Indian got out a pair of thick leather gloves, smoked them in cedar, also the traps. Next he rubbed his moccasin soles with raw meat and selecting a little bay in the shore he threw a long pole on the sand, from the line of high, dry shingle across to the water’s edge. In his hand he carried a rough stake. Walking carefully on the pole and standing on it, he drove the stake in at about four feet from the shore; then split it, and stuffed some soft moss into the split. On this he poured three or four drops of the “smell-charm.” Now he put a lump of spruce gum on the pan of the trap, holding a torch under it till the gum was fused, and into this he pressed a small, flat stone. The chain of the trap he fastened to a ten-pound stone of convenient shape, and sank the stone in the water half-way between the stake and the shore. Last he placed the trap on this stone, so that when open everything would be under water except the flat stone on the pan. Now he returned along the pole and dragged it away with him.
Thus there was now no track or scent of human near the place.
The setting was a perfect one, but even then the foxes did not go near it the following night; they must become used to it. In their code, “A strange thing is always dangerous.” In the morning Rolf was inclined to scoff. But Quonab said: “Wah! No trap goes first night.”
They did not need to wait for the second morning. In the middle of the night Skookum rushed forth barking, and they followed to see a wild struggle, the fox leaping to escape and fast to his foot was the trap with its anchor stone a-dragging.
Then was repeated the scene that ended the struggle of mink and marten. The creature’s hind feet were tied together and his body hung from a peg in the shanty. In the morning they gloated over his splendid fur and added his coat to their store of trophies.
Chapter 31. Following the Trap Line
That night the moon changed. Next day came on with a strong north wind. By noon the wild ducks had left the lake. Many long strings of geese passed southeastward, honking as they flew. Colder and colder blew the strong wind, and soon the frost was showing on the smaller ponds. It snowed a little, but this ceased. With the clearing sky the wind fell and the frost grew keener.
At daybreak, when the hunters rose, it was very cold. Everything but the open lake was frozen over, and they knew that winter was come; the time of trapping was at hand. Quonab went at once to the pinnacle on the hill, made a little fire, then chanting the “Hunter’s Prayer,” he cast into the fire the whiskers of the fox and the marten, some of the beaver castor, and some tobacco. Then descended to prepare for the trail — blankets, beaver traps, weapons, and food for two days, besides the smell-charm and some fish for bait.
Quickly the deadfalls were baited and set; last the Indian threw into the trap chamber a piece of moss on which was a drop of the “smell,” and wiped another drop on each of his moccasins. “Phew,” said Rolf.
“That make a trail the marten follow for a month,” was the explanation. Skookum seemed to think so too, and if he did not say “phew,” it was because he did not know how.
Very soon the little dog treed a flock of partridge and Rolf with blunt arrows secured three. The breasts were saved for the hunters’ table, but the rest with the offal and feathers made the best of marten baits and served for all the traps, till at noon they reached the beaver pond. It was covered with ice too thin to bear, but the freshly used landing places were easily selected. At each they set a strong, steel beaver-trap, concealing it amid some dry grass, and placing in a split stick a foot away a piece of moss in which were a few drops of the magic lure. The ring on the trap chain was slipped over a long, thin, smooth pole which was driven deep in the mud, the top pointing away from the deep water. The plan was old and proven. The beaver, eager to investigate that semifriendly smell, sets foot in the trap; instinctively when in danger he dives for the deep water; the ring slips along the pole till at the bottom and there it jams so that the beaver cannot rise again and is drowned.
In an hour the six traps were set for the beavers; presently the hunters, skirmishing for more partridges, had much trouble to save Skookum from another porcupine disaster.
They got some more grouse, baited the traps for a couple of miles, then camped for the night.
Before morning it came on to snow and it was three inches deep when they arose. There is no place on earth where the first snow is more beautiful than in the Adirondacks. In early autumn nature seems to prepare for it. Green leaves are cleared away to expose the berry bunches in red; rushbeds mass their groups, turn golden brown and bow their heads to meet the silver load; the low hills and the lines of various Christmas trees are arrayed for the finest effect: the setting is perfect and the scene, but it lacks the lime light yet. It needs must have the lavish blaze of white. And when it comes like the veil on a bride, the silver mountings on a charger’s trappings, or the golden fire in a sunset, the shining crystal robe is the finishing, the crowning glory, without which all the rest must fail, could have no bright completeness. Its beauty stirred the hunters though it found no better expression than Rolf’s simple words, “Ain’t it fine,” while the Indian gazed in silence.
There is no other place in the eastern woods where the snow has such manifold tales to tell, and the hunters that day tramping found themselves dowered over night with the wonderful power of the hound to whom each trail is a plain record of every living creature that has passed within many hours. And though the first day after a storm has less to tell than the second, just as the second has less than the third, there was no lack of story in the snow. Here sped some antlered buck, trotting along while yet the white was flying. There went a fox, sneaking across the line of march, and eying distrustfully that deadfall. This broad trail with many large tracks not far apart was made
