“Don’t you worry about losing me, daddy,” the girl assured.  “I am going to stick right close to you, no matter what happens.  But I think you had better leave this place which gives you such gloomy thoughts.  This is too nice a day to feel unhappy.”

“You are right, dear, and I suppose we had better go home.  But I like to watch those great trees over yonder.  How strong and self-reliant they are.  How proudly they lift their heads.  What storms have swept over them, and yet they stand as erect as ever.  They do not complain, but accept everything, whether sunshine or darkness, winter or summer, as a matter of course.  They are friendly, too, and their big branches seem to reach out like welcoming hands.  There is always something inspiring to me about a great forest.”

Often during the following days Jean’s mind reverted to what her father had said to her at the falls.  Although his old cheerful spirit returned, yet she observed him at times during the evenings, which were now lengthening, wrapped in thought, unheeding what was taking place around him.  This worried her a great deal, and a new sense of responsibility began to shape itself in her mind.  She believed that he missed his old home in Connecticut more than he would acknowledge, and that he was wearying of the monotonous life in the wilderness.  Perhaps he needed a change, and she wondered how this could be brought about.

She was thinking seriously of this at the close of a bright day as she pointed the bark canoe up the creek lying to the northwest of the settlement.  She had become quite expert in handling the frail craft, although, at her father’s bidding, she always paddled in shallow water.  It was a beautiful afternoon, and the mighty forest crowning the undulating hills was radiant with the beams of the streaming sun.  Slowly she moved up a narrow winding channel, the trees of the shoreward side spreading out their great branches in a leafy canopy, while on the other, acres of rushes and lily-pads lined the way.  It was a fairy-like scene through which she moved, and but for the serious thoughts which were agitating her mind, her soul would have been thrilled at the magnificent vista spreading out before her.

Reaching at length the mouth of the brook, where the shallowness of the water made further progress impossible, she ran the bow of the canoe gently upon the shore under the shade of a big maple tree.  Here she rested and viewed with interest the antics of two red squirrels as they frisked about and scolded most furiously at the intrusion of the stranger in their domain.  So funny did they appear that Jean was compelled to laugh outright.  She always enjoyed watching the tiny creatures of the wild, especially the squirrels.  She could get closer to these saucy and daring rascals of the nimble feet than their shyer comrades of the forest.