This lake is not like our northern lakes. The gravelly beach is wanting, and so are the black bass, the pickerel and other fine game fish that we find in our waters. The shores are low and muddy, the banks are thickly lined with snags, stumps and trees, and a northern boy would look twice at the dark, slimy water before he would think of going in bathing there. If he made up his mind to venture, he might think better of it if, while he was looking around for a log to put his clothes on, he should discover a large moccasin curled up in the edge of the water, and closely watching all his movements. Are these snakes poisonous? Ask Don and Bert what they think about it. They will tell you that one day last August, while they were sitting on the little wooden wharf, which juts out into the lake below the summer house, bobbing for sun-fish, they happened to look into the water a little way from the shore, and saw what appeared to be the head and neck of a goose moving rapidly along. But they knew it was not that, for summer is not the time for waterfowl down here, and besides a goose does not swim with his body submerged. It was a moccasin, and he was directing his course toward a log which lay in the water about twenty yards from the wharf. The boys knew he was a big one, or he could not have held his head so high above the water; but they were amazed at the sight of the bulk he presented to view when, reaching the log, he drew himself upon it, and stretched out flat preparatory to taking his afternoon nap. The longer the boys looked at him, the more their astonishment increased; and at last Don quietly laid down his fish-pole, and requesting his brother to keep an eye on the reptile, arose and stole off to the house. When he returned he carried a light breech-loading shot gun in his hands--one of those weapons that “break in two in the middle.” Both barrels were loaded, and Don had two more cartridges in his pocket for use in case the first should not prove effectual. The moccasin lay in such a position that Don could not see his head; so he took a hasty aim at the thickest part of his body, and fired both barrels in quick succession. He was so surprised at the effect of his shot that he did not think of the cartridges he had in his pocket. The moccasin was not killed, but he was so badly wounded that he could not get off the log. “The end his head was on was lively enough,” Don afterward told his father, “and whirled around at a great rate; but the end his tail was on seemed to be completely paralyzed, for it did not move at all.” He made the most desperate efforts to crawl off into the water, and failing in that, turned and bit himself twice, and a moment afterward was dead.