’Thump, thump, thunder-r-r.r-r-r-rrrr’
     ’Thump, thump, thunder-r-r-r-r-r-rrrr’

he rumbled again and again.

Day after day he sought the favorite log, and a new beauty, a rose-red comb, grew out above each clear, keen eye, and the clumsy snow-shoes were wholly shed from his feet.  His ruff grew finer, his eye brighter, and his whole appearance splendid to behold, as he strutted and flashed in the sun.  But-oh! he was _so lonesome now_.

Yet what could he do but blindly vent his hankering in this daily drum-parade, till on a day early in loveliest May, when the trilliums had fringed his log with silver stars, and he had drummed and longed, then drummed again, his keen ear caught a sound, a gentle footfall in the brush.  He turned to a statue and watched; he knew he had been watched.  Could it be possible?  Yes! there it was—­a form—­another—­a shy little lady grouse, now bashfully seeking to hide.  In a moment he was by her side.  His whole nature swamped by a new feeling—­burnt up with thirst—­a cooling spring in sight.  And how he spread and flashed his proud array!  How came he to know that that would please?  He puffed his plumes and contrived to stand just right to catch the sun, and strutted and uttered a low, soft chuckle that must have been just as good as the ‘sweet nothings’ of another race, for clearly now her heart was won.  Won, really, days ago, if only he had known.  For full three days she had come at the loud tattoo and coyly admired him from afar, and felt a little piqued that he had not yet found her out, so close at hand.  So it was not quite all mischance, perhaps, that that little stamp had caught his ear.  But now she meekly bowed her head with sweet, submissive grace—­the desert passed, the parch-burnt wanderer found the spring at last.

* * * * *

Oh, those were bright, glad days in the lovely glen of the unlovely name.  The sun was never so bright, and the piney air was balmier sweet than dreams.  And that great noble bird came daily on his log, sometimes with her and sometimes quite alone, and drummed for very joy of being alive.  But why sometimes alone?  Why not forever with his Brownie bride?  Why should she stay to feast and play with him for hours, then take some stealthy chance to slip away and see him no more for hours or till next day, when his martial music from the log announced him restless for her quick return?  There was a woodland mystery here he could not clear.  Why should her stay with him grow daily less till it was down to minutes, and one day at last she never came at all.  Nor the next, nor the next, and Redruff, wild, careered on lightning wing and drummed on the old log, then away up-stream on another log, and skimmed the hill to another ravine to drum and drum.  But on the fourth day, when he came and loudly called her, as of old, at their earliest tryst, he heard a sound in the bushes, as at first, and there was his missing Brownie bride with ten little peeping partridges following after.