they were new when I made them.  She asked me if I had made one just at the time of the catastrophe.  I was obliged to admit that I had made one to myself, though not aloud.  It was this.  I was thinking about the Falls, and I said to myself, “How wonderful it is to see that vast body of water tumble down there!” Then in an instant a bright thought flashed into my head, and I let it fly, saying, “It would be a deal more wonderful to see it tumble up there!”—­and I was just about to kill myself with laughing at it when all nature broke loose in war and death, and I had to flee for my life.  “There,” she said, with triumph, “that is just it; the Serpent mentioned that very jest, and called it the First Chestnut, and said it was coeval with the creation.”  Alas, I am indeed to blame.  Would that I were not witty; oh, would that I had never had that radiant thought!

Next Year

We have named it Cain.  She caught it while I was up country trapping on the North Shore of the Erie; caught it in the timber a couple of miles from our dug-out—­or it might have been four, she isn’t certain which.  It resembles us in some ways, and may be a relation.  That is what she thinks, but this is an error, in my judgment.  The difference in size warrants the conclusion that it is a different and new kind of animal—­a fish, perhaps, though when I put it in the water to see, it sank, and she plunged in and snatched it out before there was opportunity for the experiment to determine the matter.  I still think it is a fish, but she is indifferent about what it is, and will not let me have it to try.  I do not understand this.  The coming of the creature seems to have changed her whole nature and made her unreasonable about experiments.  She thinks more of it than she does of any of the other animals, but is not able to explain why.  Her mind is disordered—­everything shows it.  Sometimes she carries the fish in her arms half the night when it complains and wants to get to the water.  At such times the water comes out of the places in her face that she looks out of, and she pats the fish on the back and makes soft sounds with her mouth to soothe it, and betrays sorrow and solicitude in a hundred ways.  I have never seen her do like this with any other fish, and it troubles me greatly.  She used to carry the young tigers around so, and play with them, before we lost our property; but it was only play; she never took on about them like this when their dinner disagreed with them.

Sunday

She doesn’t work Sundays, but lies around all tired out, and likes to have the fish wallow over her; and she makes fool noises to amuse it, and pretends to chew its paws, and that makes it laugh.  I have not seen a fish before that could laugh.  This makes me doubt....  I have come to like Sunday myself.  Superintending all the week tires a body so.  There ought to be more Sundays.  In the old days they were tough, but now they come handy.