The following morning the bee-hunter commenced his preparations for a change of residence.  Had he not been discovered, it is probable that the news received from the Chippewa would not have induced him to abandon his present position, so early in the season; but he thought the risk of remaining was too great under all the circumstances.  The Pottawattamie, in particular, was a subject of great distrust to him, and he believed it highly possible some of that old chief’s tribe might be after his scalp ere many suns had risen.  Gershom acquiesced in these opinions, and, as soon as his brain was less under the influence of liquor than was common with him, he appeared to be quite happy in having it in his power to form a species of alliance, offensive and defensive, with a man of his own color and origin.  Great harmony now prevailed between the two, Gershom improving vastly in all the better qualities, the instant his intellect and feelings got to be a little released from the thraldom of the jug.  His own immediate store of whiskey was quite exhausted, and le Bourdon kept the place in which his own small stock of brandy was secured a profound secret.  These glimmerings of returning intellect, and of reviving principles, are by no means unusual with the sot, thus proving that “so long as there is life, there is hope,” for the moral, as well as for the physical being.  What was a little remarkable, Gershom grew less vulgar, even in his dialect, as he grew more sober, showing that in all respects he was becoming a greatly improved person.

The men were several hours in loading the canoe, not only all the stores and ammunition, but all the honey being transferred to it.  The bee-hunter had managed to conceal his jug of brandy, reduced by this time to little more than a quart, within an empty powder-keg, into which he had crammed a beaver-skin or two, that he had taken, as it might be incidentally, in the course of his rambles.  At length everything was removed and stowed in its proper place, on board the capacious canoe, and Gershom expected an announcement on the part of Ben of his readiness to embark.  But there still remained one duty to perform.  The beehunter had killed a buck only the day before the opening of our narrative, and shouldering a quarter, he had left the remainder of the animal suspended from the branches of a tree, near the place where it had been shot and cleaned.  As venison might be needed before they could reach the mouth of the river, Ben deemed it advisable that he and Gershom should go and bring in the remainder of the carcass.  The men started on this undertaking accordingly, leaving the canoe about two in the afternoon.