The wooden trap is used in some localities. It consists of a wide half log, about twelve feet in length, with level face up. With this log for a bottom, a long box is formed by using for the sides two similar half logs, fastened with flat sides facing each other along the edges of the bottom log. Into one end of this box is pinned a heavy timber inclined at an angle over the bed of the box, and supported by sticks constructed like a figure four, baited with bread and honey, or meat. Rocks are fastened to its elevated end to increase its weight. The bear, attracted by the sweet smell of the honey, ventures in, pulls the figure four to pieces, and is crushed down by the fallen cover. If not killed he is effectually pinned until the merciless trapper unintentionally shows some mercy by ending his struggles. As the white-haired Wid said: “Traps is good fer ’em ez hunts rabbits, an’ rabbit huntin’ is good fer boys; but fer me gim me my ole flint-lock shootin’-iron, an’ let a keen pack o’ lean hounds be hoppin’ on ahead; an’ of all sports, the master sport is follerin’ their music over the mountings, an’ windin’ up, with bullet or sticker, a varminous ole bar!” THE VALLEY OF THE NOON-DAY SUN. It is one of those numerous _chef-d’œuvre_ of creation which God has scattered over the earth, but which He conceals so frequently on the summit of naked rocks, in the depth of inaccessible ravines, on the unapproachable shores of the ocean, like jewels which He unveils rarely, and that only to simple beings, to children, to shepherds, or fishermen, or the devout worshippers of nature.--_Lamartine._ [Illustration: I]n Macon county, North Carolina, is a section of country so seldom visited by strangers, that few persons living beyond its limits are aware of its existence, except as they find it located on the map. In pomp of forest, purity of water, beauty of sky, wildness of mountains, combining in a wonderful wealth of sublime scenery, the valley of the Nantihala river is not surpassed by any region of the Alleghanies. While a great portion of Macon and of other counties have had attention occasionally called to them by magazine articles, and by a few novels with plots laid in the familiar picturesque sections, the Nantihala and the mountains mirrored on its surface, have to this day remained an unrolled scroll. This is not strange, from the fact of the wild and rugged nature of the mountains, its few inhabitants, its remoteness from railroads, and the roughness of the highways and trails by which it is traversed. Even the ambitious tourist who enters Western North Carolina with the purpose of seeing all the points of picturesque interest, finds his summer vacation at a close before he has completed a tour of those scenic sections lying within a radius of fifty miles from Asheville.