Snowflakes and Sunbeams; Or, The Young Fur-traders: A Tale of the Far North, - [best summer reads .txt] 📗

hastened home; for it just occurred to me that I had forgotten to visit Louis Blanc, who cut his foot with an axe yesterday, and whose wound required redressing, so I left the poor youth to learn from experience.”

“Pray, who did you leave to that delightful fate?” asked Mr. Wilson, issuing from his bedroom, and approaching the stove.

Mr. Wilson was a middle-aged, good-humoured, active man, who filled the onerous offices of superintendent of the men, trader of furs, seller of goods to the Indians, and general factotum.

“Our friend Hamilton,” answered the doctor, in reply to his question. “I think he is, without exception, the most egregious nincompoop I ever saw. Just as I passed the long swamp on my way home, I met him crashing through the bushes in hot pursuit of a rabbit, the track of which he mistook for a fox. Poor fellow! He had been out since breakfast, and only shot a brace of ptarmigan, although they are as thick as bees and quite tame. ‘But then, do you see,’ said he, in excuse, ‘I’m so very shortsighted! Would you believe it, I’ve blown fifteen lumps of snow to atoms, in the belief that they were ptarmigan!’ and then he rushed off again.”

“No doubt,” said Mr. Wilson, smiling, “the lad is very green, but he’s a good fellow for all that.”

“I’ll answer for that,” said the accountant; “I found him over at the men’s houses this morning doing your work for you, doctor.”

“How so?” inquired the disciple of Æsculapius.

“Attending to your wounded man, Louis Blanc, to be sure; and he seemed to speak to him as wisely as if he had walked the hospitals, and regularly passed for an M.D.”

“Indeed!” said the doctor, with a mischievous grin. “Then I must pay him off for interfering with my patients.”

“Ah, doctor, you’re too fond of practical jokes. You never let slip an opportunity of ‘paying off’ your friends for something or other. It’s a bad habit. Practical jokes are very bad things—shockingly bad,” said Mr. Wilson, as he put on his fur cap, and wound a thick shawl round his throat, preparatory to leaving the room.

As Mr. Wilson gave utterance to this opinion, he passed Harry Somerville, who was still staring at the fire in deep mental abstraction, and, as he did so, gave his tilted chair a very slight push backwards with his finger—an action which caused Harry to toss up his legs, grasp convulsively with both hands at empty air, and fall with a loud noise and an angry yell to the ground, while his persecutor vanished from the scene.

“O you outrageous villain!” cried Harry, shaking his fist at the door, as he slowly gathered himself up; “I might have expected that.”

“Quite so,” said the doctor; “you might. It was very neatly done, undoubtedly. Wilson deserves credit for the way in which it was executed.”

“He deserves to be executed for doing it at all,” replied Harry, rubbing his elbow as he resumed his seat.

“Any bark knocked off?” inquired the accountant, as he took a piece of glowing charcoal from the stove wherewith to light his pipe. “Try a whiff, Harry. It’s good for such things. Bruises, sores, contusions, sprains, rheumatic affections of the back and loins, carbuncles and earache—there’s nothing that smoking won’t cure; eh, doctor?”

“Certainly. If applied inwardly, there’s nothing so good for digestion when one doesn’t require tonics—Try it, Harry; it will do you good, I assure you.”

“No, thank you,” replied Harry; “I’ll leave that to you and the chimney. I don’t wish to make a soot-bag of my mouth. But tell me, doctor, what do you mean to do with that lump of snow there?”

Harry pointed to a mass of snow, of about two feet square, which lay on the floor beside the door. It had been placed there by the doctor some time previously.

“Do with it? Have patience, my friend, and you shall see. It is a little surprise I have in store for Hamilton.”

As he spoke, the door opened, and a short, square-built man rushed into the room, with a pistol in one hand and a bright little bullet in the other.

“Hollo, skipper!” cried Harry, “what’s the row?”

“All right,” cried the skipper; “here it is at last, solid as the fluke of an anchor. Toss me the powder-flask Harry; look sharp, else it’ll melt.”

A powder-flask was immediately produced, from which the skipper hastily charged the pistol, and rammed down the shining bullet.

“Now then,” said he, “look out for squalls. Clear the decks there.”

And rushing to the door, he flung it open, took a steady aim at something outside, and fired.

“Is the man mad?” said the accountant, as with a look of amazement he beheld the skipper spring through the doorway, and immediately return bearing in his arms a large piece of fir plank.

“Not quite mad yet,” he said, in reply, “but I’ve sent a ball of quicksilver through an inch plank, and that’s not a thing to be done every day—even here, although it is cold enough sometimes to freeze up one’s very ideas.”

“Dear me,” interrupted Harry Somerville, looking as if a new thought had struck him, “that must be it! I’ve no doubt that poor Hamilton’s ideas are frozen, which accounts for the total absence of any indication of his possessing such things.”

“I observed,” continued the skipper, not noticing the interruption, “that the glass was down at 45 degrees below zero this morning, and put out a bullet-mould full of mercury, and you see the result.” As he spoke he held up the perforated plank in triumph.

The skipper was a strange mixture of qualities. To a wild, off-hand, sailor-like hilarity of disposition in hours of leisure, he united a grave, stern energy of character while employed in the performance of his duties. Duty was always paramount with him. A smile could scarcely be extracted from him while it was in the course of performance. But the instant his work was done a new spirit seemed to take possession of the man. Fun, mischief of any kind, no matter how childish, he entered into with the greatest delight and enthusiasm. Among other peculiarities, he had become deeply imbued with a thirst for scientific knowledge, ever since he had acquired, with infinite labour, the small modicum of science necessary to navigation; and his doings in pursuit of statistical information relative to the weather, and the phenomena of nature generally, were very peculiar, and in some cases outrageous. His transaction with the quicksilver was in consequence of an eager desire to see that metal frozen (an effect which takes place when the spirit-of-wine thermometer falls to 39 degrees below zero of Fahrenheit), and a wish to be able to boast of having actually fired a mercurial bullet through an inch plank. Having made a careful note of the fact, with all the relative circumstances attending it, in a very much blotted book, which he denominated his scientific log, the worthy skipper threw off his coat, drew a chair to the stove, and prepared to regale himself with a pipe. As he glanced slowly round the room while thus engaged, his eye fell on the mass of snow before alluded to. On being informed by the doctor for what it was intended, he laid down his pipe and rose hastily from his chair.

“You’ve not a moment to lose,” said he. “As I came in at the gate just now, I saw Hamilton coming down the river on the ice, and he must be almost arrived now.”

“Up with it then,” cried the doctor, seizing the snow, and lifting it to the top of the door. “Hand me those bits of stick, Harry; quick, man, stir your stumps.—Now then, skipper, fix them in so, while I hold this up.”

The skipper lent willing and effective aid, so that in a few minutes the snow was placed in such a position that upon the opening of the door it must inevitably fall on the head of the first person who should enter the room.

“So,” said the skipper, “that’s rigged up in what I call ship-shape fashion.”

“True,” remarked the doctor, eyeing the arrangement with a look of approval; “it will do, I think, admirably.”

“Don’t you think, skipper,” said Harry Somerville gravely, as he resumed his seat in front of the fire, “that it would be worth while to make a careful and minute entry in your private log of the manner in which it was put up, to be afterwards followed by an account of its effect? You might write an essay on it now, and call it the extraordinary effects of a fall of snow in latitude so and so, eh? What think you of it?”

The skipper vouchsafed no reply, but made a significant gesture with his fist, which caused Harry to put himself in a posture of defence.

At this moment footsteps were heard on the wooden platform in front of the building.

Instantly all became silence and expectation in the hall as the result of the practical joke was about to be realised. Just then another step was heard on the platform, and it became evident that two persons were approaching the door.

“Hope it’ll be the right man,” said the skipper, with a look savouring slightly of anxiety.

As he spoke the door opened, and a foot crossed the threshold; the next instant the miniature avalanche descended on the head and shoulders of a man, who reeled forward from the weight of the blow, and, covered from head to foot with snow, fell to the ground amid shouts of laughter.

With a convulsive stamp and shake, the prostrate figure sprang up and confronted the party. Had the cast-iron stove suddenly burst into atoms, and blown the roof off the house, it could scarcely have created greater consternation than that which filled the merry jesters when they beheld the visage of Mr. Rogan, the superintendent of the fort, red with passion and fringed with snow.

“So,” said he, stamping violently with his foot, partly from anger, and partly with a view of shaking off the unexpected covering, which stuck all over his dress in little patches, producing a somewhat piebald effect,—“so you are pleased to jest, gentlemen. Pray, who placed that piece of snow over the door?” Mr. Rogan glared fiercely round upon the culprits, who stood speechless before him.

For a moment he stood silent, as if uncertain how to act; then turning short on his heel, he strode quickly out of the room, nearly overturning Mr. Hamilton, who at the same instant entered it, carrying his gun and snowshoes under his arm.

“Dear me, what has happened?” he exclaimed, in a peculiarly gentle tone of voice, at the same time regarding the snow and the horror-stricken circle with a look of intense surprise.

“You see what has happened,” replied Harry Somerville, who was the first to recover his composure; “I presume you intended to ask, ‘What has caused it to happen?’ Perhaps the skipper will explain; it’s beyond me, quite.”

Thus appealed to, that worthy cleared his throat, and said,—

“Why, you see, Mr. Hamilton, a great phenomenon of meteorology has happened. We were all standing, you must know, at the open door, taking a squint at the weather, when our attention was attracted by a curious object that appeared in the sky, and seemed to be coming down at the rate of ten knots an hour, right end-on for the house. I had just time to cry, ‘Clear out, lads,’ when it came slap in through the doorway, and smashed to shivers there, where you see the fragments. In fact, it’s a wonderful aërolite, and Mr. Rogan has just gone out with a lot of the bits in his pocket, to make a careful examination of them, and draw up a report for the Geological Society in London. I shouldn’t wonder if he were to send off an express to-night; and maybe you will have to convey the news to headquarters, so you’d better go and see him about it soon.”

Soft although Mr. Hamilton was supposed to be, he was not quite prepared to give credit to this explanation; but being of a peaceful disposition, and altogether unaccustomed to retort, he merely smiled his disbelief, as he proceeded to lay aside his fowling-piece, and divest himself of the voluminous out-of-door trappings with which he was clad. Mr. Hamilton was a tall, slender youth, of about nineteen. He had come out by the ship in autumn, and was spending his first winter at York Fort. Up to the period of his entering the Hudson’s Bay Company’s service, he had never been more than twenty miles from home, and having mingled little with the world, was somewhat unsophisticated, besides being by nature gentle and unassuming.

Soon after this the man who acted as cook, waiter, and butler to the mess, entered, and said that Mr. Rogan desired to see the accountant immediately.

“Who am I to