Levi was starting a fire, Ray washing potatoes, and Martin, in his shirt-sleeves, using a towel vigorously near the canoes, when Angie and Chip emerged that morning; and now while breakfast is under way, a moment may be seized to explain who these people were and their mission in this wilderness. Many years before, in a distant village called Greenvale, two brothers, David and Amzi Curtis, had quarrelled over an unfortunate division of inherited land. The outcome was that Amzi, somewhat misanthropic over the death of his wife, and of peculiar make-up, deserted his home and little daughter Angeline, and vanished. For many years no one knew of his whereabouts, and he was given up as dead. In the meantime his child, cared for by a kindly woman known as Aunt Comfort, had grown to womanhood. About this time a boyhood sweetheart of Angeline's, named Martin Frisbie, who had been gathering wealth in a distant city, invited a former schoolmate, now the village doctor in Greenvale, to join him on an outing trip into the wilderness. Here something of the history of a notorious outlaw named McGuire became known to Martin, and more important than that, a queer old hermit was discovered, dwelling in solitude on the shore of a small lake. Who he was, and why this strange manner of life, Martin could not learn, and not until later, when he returned to Greenvale to woo his former sweetheart once more, did he even guess. Here, however, from a description furnished by a village nondescript,--a sort of Natty Bumpo and philosopher combined, known as Old Cy Walker, who had been Martin's youthful companion,--he was led to believe that the queer hermit and the long-missing Amzi were one and the same. Another trip into this wilderness with Old Cy, taken to identify the hermit, resulted in proving the correctness of the surmise. Then Martin set about making this misanthropic recluse more comfortable in all ways possible; and then, leaving Old Cy to keep him company, he returned to Greenvale and Angie. A marriage was the outcome of his return to his native village, and then, with his nephew, Ray, and long-tried guide, Levi, as helpers on this unique wedding trip, the hermit was visited. It was hoped that meeting his child once more would result in inducing him to abandon his wildwood existence and to return to civilization; and it did--partially. He seemed happy to meet his daughter again, consented to return with them when ready, and after a couple of weeks' sojourn here, the canoes were packed and all set out for civilization and Greenvale once more. But "home, sweet home," albeit it was, as in this case, a lonely log cabin in a vast wilderness, proved stronger than parental love or aught else; and sometime during first night's camp on the way out, this strange recluse stole away in his canoe and returned.