“Paddle yourself,” growls Hull, who always entertained a decided objection to much exertion, although in the enthusiasm of the moment he had grasped one of the propellers. I seize the paddle he relinquishes, and whilst he seats himself sluggishly on the side of the scow, I bend myself to my task. The skiff is by this time half way over; and the good-natured laugh of its party at our troubles, comes ringing over the water. However, after a while we “get the hang” of the odd thing, and the pleasant tap, tap, tap of the ripples at its front, tell that we are moving merrily forward. Oh, isn’t the kiss of that wandering air-breath delicious! Whew! what a fluttering and whizzing! A flock of wild ducks, scared up from that long, grassy shallow to the right. How the sunshine gleams upon their purple backs, and flashes from their rapid wings. There they go toward the outlet at “the mills.” And the water, how beautifully mottled are its depths; how clear and transparent! It seems almost like another atmosphere. See the fishes swarming below. There goes a shiner like a flash of silver; is that an ingot of gold shooting past there, or a yellow perch? And, upon my word, if there wasn’t a salmon-trout showing its long, dark wavy back beside that log at the bottom, large enough for a six-pounder. I do wish we had our lines here. However, we came for a pic-nic, not a “fish.” Well, here we are at the recess, and the skiff has been here certainly these fifteen minutes. It is a beautiful place, really. The bank recedes in a half circle from the water, leaving a space of short, thick turf, with an edge of pure white sand, on which the ripples cream up and melt in the most delicate lace-work. The place is in cool shadow, cast by the tall trees of the forest crowning the bank—and such fine trees, too. There is the white birch, with its stem of silver-satin; the picturesque grim hemlock, soaring into the heavens, with a naked top dripping with gray moss; the beech, showing a bark spotted like a woodpecker; and the maple, lifting upon a trunk fluted like a cathedral-column, a green dome of foliage, as regular as if fashioned by an architect. Of all the forest-trees the maple is my favorite, although it is somewhat difficult to select where all are so beautiful. Besides the birch, hemlock, and beech, above mentioned, there is the poplar or aspen, which, although horribly nervous, is a very pretty tree. The stem is smooth and polished, with white streaks over its green; the limbs stretch out broadly, and the leaves are finely cut with a “white lining” underneath. When the breezes are stirring, the changes of the tree are marvellous; and its whispers in a still, sunny, noon, when the rest of the woodland is motionless, are delightful, like the continuous and rapid drip, drip, drip, of a little rill in the grass. Then there is the elm, bending over its flexile summit in a perpetual bow to the trees around it, with