FRANK FORESTER'S WOODLAND ADVENTURES.*
THE matter of this book is a sort of repetition of Mr. Herbert's "Field Sports in the United States," thrown into a dramatic form, and varied by the introduction of characters and adventures. This mode of compo- sition may render the book more attractive and readable in a popular sense, but it is less directly and completely informing, and partakes somewhat of the magazine-article character : there is too much of de- scription for description's sake, and a good deal too much of eating and drinking in the style of the "silver fork" school, literally as well as metaphorically. Nevertheless, it effects the writer's object ; which is to pre- sent a popular account of field-sports in the more settled States of America, with sketches of sporting life, and the "characters" the sportsman is likely to come in contact with. To such readers as have not met with the "Field Sports," the present volumes will afford much amusement. The writing is as good as that of any English sporting tales ; the American scenery and style of shooting imparts novelty ; while the persons and tales will yield variety even to those who are acquainted with Mr. Forester's former book.
The framework is this. Harry Archer, an Englishman settled in New York, is visited by his friend Frank Forester ; and the new corner is of course initiated into American sporting ; the field scenes being relieved by the passage to the ground, evening table-talk and occurrences, and the persons with whom the evening is passed. The sport of the " Britishers " is bird-shooting, stag-shooting, and fox-hunting ; but stories are told of adventures with the wolf, the fiercer wild animals being extinct in the settled regions. Woodcraft is varied by tales de- scriptive of American manners ; one of which relates to intrigue and murder in the woods ; the other to a love-story and elopement, a second English visiter being the hero, and the lady's brother (a rampant demagogue and "Young American," hostile to everything English) the obstacle. There is also an interest from the dramatis personte ; one of whom Dolph Pierson, an old hunter of Dutch blood, is as peculiar and well-drawn as some of Cooper's ; but Tom Draw, an American innkeeper, of immense bulk, activity, waggery, and good-humour—a sort of Fal- staff of the woodlands— is the most amusing person. There are no sketches of American gentlemen-sportsmen : which is a defect, as that would have given more variety, and introduced a new style of man.
For extract, we take, as more convenient than the longer sporting
scenes and stories, the tale of' an adventure with wolves, told by Dolph as a reason against drinking too much. "I rigged up a jumper, and loaded it with peltry, and hitched up old Roan, and °fed to Jess Wood's—twenty mile, I guess—through a blazed wood road, meanin' to fit me a keg or two of powder and some bars of lead, sell off my plunder, and he back same night. Off I went sartin; but when I comed to Jess's, there was a turkey-shoot you see, and a hull grist o' boys; and we shot days, and drinked and Played nights; and to be done with 't, 'twas the third day, putty well on for oight, when I started, and I putty hot at that. Well, it was moonlight nights, and I got along smart and easy till I got on the hill, jest above the beaver-dam. The beaver-dam warn't broke then, and the pond was full, but it was fruz right sharp and hard ; and I went over it at a smart trot, and was thinkin' I'd be hum io an hour, when jest as I was half ways over I heerd a wolf howl, and then an- other, and then another, and in less time than I can tell you there was thutty or tut), of them devils a jabberin' as fast as iver you heerd Frenchmen, on my trail; and afore I was well acrost I could see them comin', yelpia' and screechin all in black snarl like, all on 'em together, over the clear ice. Well, I whipped up old "an; and little whip he needed, for when he heerd them yell he laid down his teu, and laid down his belly to the snow, and by thunder, didn't he strick it tilough! Over rough, over smooth, up bill and down hollow, and oncet I thought Frank Forester and his Friends; or Woodland Adventures in the Middle States of .otth America. By Henry William Herbert. Author of "Field Sports In the United States," marmaduke Wyvil," &c. In three volumes. Published by Bentley. we should run a clear out of hearin' on 'em. But goin' up the big mountain, when we was nigh the crown, I carn't tell how it was adzactly, but pitch down we went into a darned rocky hole; and the foist thing I knowed I was half head over in the snow, and the jumper broke to eternal smash, and old Roan gone ahead like the wind, and I left alone to fight fawty howlin' devils, and putty hot at that. Well, I tuk heart, and fixed my rifle, and as they come a yelpin' up the hill I dmwed stret, and shot one down, and run like thunder, aloadin' as I went, for I knowed as the bloody devils would stop to tar' the one I'd wounded into slivers, and while they was a teeing him for sartin, their screeches mout a' made a body's hair stand up on his head like; but they soon quit that fun, and took my trail agin in airnest. Well, I got loaded, and I went to prime, and darned if my flint hadn't got smashed to pieces ! I felt in my pouch, in my pockets—not a flint I was hot, sal telled you, when I quit Jess's, and left them on the bar. Oh, warn't I in a fix1 and there warn't no big trees nuther ; and if there had a been, it was BO bitter cold I thought a man mast a' died afore it was mornin'. But I thought it warn't no use to say die, no how; so I run for the biggest tree and clum it. It warn't thicker nor my body much, a stunt hemlock, not over fifteen feet, or eighteen at most, to the lust limb, and none higher that would bear my weight, and a tight match if that would. Well, I clum it, and there from eleven o'clock of a winter's night I sot perishin' with cold, and a'most dead with fear—I arn't easily skeart nuther—with them fawty devils howliu' under me, and lickin' their bloody chaps, and glarin' with their fiery eyes, and ivery now and then a big 'un jumpin' within three feet of the limb I sot on, and the limb crackin' and the tree beudin', 'at I thought it 'ud go ivery minnit. Day broke at last, and then I hoped they'd a quit—but not they. The sun riz; still thar they was a circlin' round the tree, madder nor iver, foamin' and frothin' at their jaws, and oncet and agin fightin' and tearin' at one another. Gentlemen, I was a young stout man when I clam that hemlock, and my hair was as black as a crow's back. When I fell down, for come down I didn't, I was as thin and as bent, ay, and as white-headed as you see me. Since then I never drinked only when I war dry, and then niver over oncet in the morale and oncet agin at night.' " ' But how, in Heaven's name, did you escape them ? ' asked Forester, who was interested beyond measure in the wild narrative. "'By Heaven's help! 'answered the hunter, solemnly. 'Some chaps chanced on old Roan's carcass in the woods, arter they devils killed him, and knowed whose horse he war, and tuk the back track, and come down on the mad brutes from to leeward, with seven good true rifles. They killed five on 'em at the flak shot, let alone what they wounded; and the rest made stret tracks, but I didn't see it. For at the crack of the fust shot my head went round and round, and I pitched down right amongst them. But they was skeart as bad as I was, and hadn't no time to look after me.''
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