This stream was so withdrawn, and the moose-tracks were so fresh, that my companions, still bent on hunting, concluded to go farther up it and camp, and then hunt up or down at night.  Half a mile above this, at a place where I saw the aster puniceus and the beaked hazel, as we paddled along, Joe, hearing a slight rustling amid the alders, and seeing something black about two rods off, jumped up and whispered, “Bear!” but before the hunter had discharged his piece, he corrected himself to “Beaver!”—­“Hedgehog!” The bullet killed a large hedgehog, more than two feet and eight inches long.  The quills were rayed out and flattened on the hinder part of its back, even as if it had lain on that part, but were erect and long between this and the tail.  Their points, closely examined, were seen to be finely bearded or barbed, and shaped like an awl, that is, a little concave, to give the barbs effect.  After about a mile of still water, we prepared our camp on the right side, just at the foot of a considerable fall.  Little chopping was done that night, for fear of scaring the moose.  We had moose-meat fried for supper.  It tasted like tender beef, with perhaps more flavor,—­sometimes like veal.

After supper, the moon having risen, we proceeded to hunt a mile up this stream, first “carrying” about the falls.  We made a picturesque sight, wending single-file along the shore, climbing over rocks and logs,—­Joe, who brought up the rear, twirling his canoe in his hands as if it were a feather, in places where it was difficult to get along without a burden.

We launched the canoe again from the ledge over which the stream fell, but after half a mile of still water, suitable for hunting, it became rapid again, and we were compelled to make our way along the shore, while Joe endeavored to get up in the birch alone, though it was still very difficult for him to pick his way amid the rocks in the night.  We on the shore found the worst of walking, a perfect chaos of fallen and drifted trees, and of bushes projecting far over the water, and now and then we made our way across the mouth of a small tributary on a kind of net-work of alders.  So we went tumbling on in the dark, being on the shady side, effectually scaring all the moose and bears that might be thereabouts.  At length we came to a standstill, and Joe went forward to reconnoitre; but he reported that it was still a continuous rapid as far as he went, or half a mile, with no prospect of improvement, as if it were coming down from a mountain.  So we turned about, hunting back to the camp through the still water.  It was a splendid moonlight night, and I, getting sleepy as it grew late,—­for I had nothing to do,—­found it difficult to realize where I was.  This stream was much more unfrequented than the main one, lumbering operations being no longer carried on in this quarter.  It was only three or four rods wide, but the firs and spruce through which it trickled seemed yet taller