casses of black bear dressed and returned to their skins, the skin of a magnificent catamount, with the skull and claws attached, which he had heard me say I would like to have, a half-dozen skins of the beautiful fur of the pine marten or the American sable, more than one hundred pounds of brook trout, ten dozen of ruffed grouse all dressed and braided into bunches of a half-dozen, and some smaller game, with some specimen skins of the mink and fox. There was more game than my family could have consumed in a year.

I selected a liberal supply of the game and took the skins intended for myself and family. For the balance my butcher paid him liberally, and this money with his savings would have more than paid his mortgage. But I would not so soon lose my hold upon him. He had told me that if he could build an addition to his house his wife could keep four boarders while he was guiding in the summer. induced him to save money enough for this addition, and to purchase the furniture then and there. He paid the interest and costs and a part of the principal of his mortgage, and went home loaded with presents for Bessie and the children-a very happy

man.

I

On the 2d of August, this time with two gentlemen and their wives, all safe companions in roughing it, as we approached the landing at Bartlett's, Mitchell and Alonzo were waiting for us. There was no need to ask Mitchell if he had kept his promise. His eye was as clear and keen as that of a goshawk. The muscles visible in their action under his transparent dark skin, his voice, ringing with cheerfulness, all told of a healthy body and a sound

mind. His wife, he said, had her house filled with boarders, his oldest son had been employed as a guide for the entire season, and prosperity shone upon the Sabattis household.

Where should we go? I consulted him about the location of our camp. He said that "Lon" and himself knew what kind of a place we wanted. We didn't want visitors or black flies-we wanted a beautiful location, with mountains, lakes, brooks, and springs, with abundance of game. Himself and "'Lon" knew such a place-they had left home, built a camp for us there, and if we would make a long day of it they would row us there at once.

This chapter is already too long. I have no time to tell of the beauty of our camp, the abundance of the game, the sympathy of all our party, the fawn we caught, tamed and enjoyed, and left in its native. woods, and the fidelity of our guides which made those weeks a green oasis in all our lives. Nor can I describe the subsequent lives of those guides. Wetherby, one of the strongest men I ever knew and of unexceptionable habits, died of a fever in the following year.

My destiny led me far away from the Adirondacks. The last I had heard from Mitchell was when he sent me a draft on New York for considerably more than the balance due upon his mortgage. The locality had become too easy of access-visitors were too numerous. It had so few attractions that I did not visit it for many years. But in 1885 the old feeling came over me, and with such of my family as had not gone out from me into homes of their own, I went to a new and fashionable hotel some thirty miles from Long Lake. From an old

resident who knew it thoroughly I had the subsequent history of Mitchell Sabattis. He had never broken his promise to me. He united with the Methodist Church and became one of its leaders, and in a few years was the leading citizen in the Long Lake settlement. In worldly matters he prospered. His wife kept a favorite resort for summer visitors. Their children were educated, the daughters married well-two of the sons served their country with courage and gallantry through the war, returned home unwounded with honorable discharges, and now guided in summer and built the celebrated Adirondack boats in the winter. Mitchell, now a hale and healthy veteran of eighty-four years, still lived at Long Lake in the very house of which I was once the mortgagee.

I opened it see me as I

But I was

The next morning I heard a light step on the uncarpeted hall and a knock at my door. and Sabattis entered. He was as glad to was to grasp his true and honest hand. profoundly surprised. Had the world with him. stood still? He did not look a day older than when I last saw him, more than twenty-five years ago. The same keen, clear eye, transparent skin with the play of the muscles under it, the same elastic step, ringing voice and kindly heart. His eye was not dim nor his natural force abated. We spent a memorable day together-at nightfall we parted forever. Not long afterward he died full of years, full of honors, that noblest work of God, an honest

man.

Reader! this is not a "short story" and it is not a novel. It is a true story, and of course has its moral, which is that a kind word or an inexpensive

favor may sometimes save a fellow-creature and change him into a useful man.

To him who be

stows either, I could not wish a more delightful memory than that of my relations with Mitchell Sabattis.

CHAPTER XVII.

THE ADIRONDACK REGION-A WARNING TO THE DESTROYER-A PLEA FOR THE PERISHING.

THE Adirondack region is an uneven plateau, having an average elevation about eighteen hundred feet above the sea-level, in area nearly equal to the three States of New Hampshire, Vermont, and Massachusetts. Its crystalline rocks preceded, its sandstones witnessed the dawn of animal life upon the Western Continent. Its mountains are loftier than any east of the Father of the Waters. Its rivers are numbered by fifties, its lakes by hundreds. Away back in primordial times the forces of nature raised its. surface into the dominion of monthly frosts, unfitted it for agriculture and pasturage, and restricted it to the growth of evergreens and deciduous trees, dwarfed upon its peaks but reaching an average height in its valleys and on its sheltered plains. God made it, not for the habitation of man but for that of the natural occupants of the forest, lake, and river. In his economy it was most useful to man when its original condition was maintained. If the great cities of a numerous people were to be built on the waterways of a mighty commerce, all the greater necessity that here should be a great preserve in fact as well as in name. It was the natural home of all the land and fresh-water animals of the fortyfifth parallel. The call of the great moose was com