The times. (Owosso, Mich.) 1882-1897, 1882-07-07
PION T. l. LIFE
IN THE
NORTH-WE EST.
BY JENNIE JONES.

Well, we can look back and see the pic
ture of the next few w~eeks-dark, purple
cheeks, swollen noses, nailless toes. and
ringless ears. But the jolly frolic and
bounteous repast that we found at "the
Dance" soon scattered all thoughts Of
care. The return mex morning showed
us the perilous, circuitous route w had
taken, when, but for our horses, we all
would have persisted, instead of living to
talk over the jollity and fun of pioneer
days. L. s.
ANOTHER WINTERS RIDE.
We were or a Journeys party of four
three women, with only one man
on whose courage, if not strength, we had
to rely in times of trouble and danger.
We had ~journeyed nearly all day through
heavy pine woods, and at five o'clock
came to the last hotel, and, in truth, the
last house in the woods, at which we had
intended to pass the night. On stopping
we found the house about full of travel
ers, and as we did not like the looks Of
things very well, We resolved to push on
seven miles further, when we would be
through the woods and at a considerable
town on the other side.
Had the night been clear we would
have had no story to tell, as we were well
acquainted with the road, and, in fact,
there was no urn of, except such as led
to some logging shanties in the woods.
But the winters night came on soon after
we left the hotel, and the clouds, which
had been threatening snow all day, grew
heavier, and the night darker. Soon the
snow began to fall, not in cold, drifting
flakes, but in great, heavy dampness that
nearly blinded lis, and that would lay
piled up On our heads, our shoulders, or
wherever they CHANGED to fall. The
shadow Of the pines was dark and we
could not see the track, and had only to
trust to our horses to keep the road,
which we knew was being fast obliterated.
by the heavy falling snow. We had trav-
eled what we believed to he about half
the distance, and it was equally as well
to go forward as to TURF back. And now
the trees seemed to be Of a different class
from those we had expected to find, and
we had long since ceased to discover any
known landmarks. Our horses stumbled
I'VE a fallen tree or two, and we found
ourselves on the edge of a small chop
ping, and remembered that there was no
chopping on the road we had passed a
few days before. We got out and found
that our horses were following a dim
track, but we knew that we were lost in
the depths of a pine forest, at night, in
the dead of winter, while the fast falling
snow would cover even our dim road be-
fore morning. There was one ray of hope,
however, to cheer us. The chopping had
been done recently, and by human hands,
and perhaps there was a shanty near.
We kept on q little farther when we were
cheered by the sight of a dim light in
the distance-a veritable star of Bethle-
hem in our wanderings. This vas soon
reached, and we found two men, the occu-
pants of a small logging shanty, and upon
inquiring we found that We were still
seven miles from the town-the haven Of
rest we sought.
After considerable delay one OF the men
concluded that he "wanted to go to town
anyway" and kindly volun-
to pilot us through that night, an
offer we were only too glad to accept. And
so, trusting implicitly to this woodsman's
we got TO the village about
twelve o'clock, in a sorry plight-the snow
piled something less than a foot deep o n
each Of our heads, wells and hats a per-
feet ruin, horses tired out, and ourselves
10 cot ,,,Ia, haIfa~ anI <hnro,,r1Ix,
resolved never again to try to cross a
pine forest after nightfall.
LOST.
Of all unpleasant experiences, none,
perhaps, were more so than the not un-
one Of being lost in the woods,
far from any human habitation, knowing
that nothing but a dense wilderness lies
all around you, except, perhaps, in n
direction, and that direction unknown to
you. One narrative of this kind I had
to have given ere this, and now
will but briefly sketch it.
1t was at 9 o'clock one morning in au-
that a courageous German woman
set out from home to search for her cows,
which had strayed away. at about noon
she discovered that she had lost her way,
but continued to wander aimlessly about
until near nightfall, when she came to the
banks Of a clear, beautiful lake. This
lake was isolated, and perhaps was not
once a year by white men, but, to
use her own words, it looked like a good
place, and so she sat down to
wait, in the hope that some stray fisher
man might visit the spot and show her
The way out. She staid there that night,
and the next day, patiently waiting, yes,
and for four long, solitary days, making
i've days from home, without food, save a
wild berries, and no companionship
ave the solitary woods and the water
no sound ave q wild birds distant notes.
Only once was the %monotony broken, and
hat was when, as she supposed, two
black puppies came out of the
woods, and came so near her that she
could almost put her hand on them, frol-
cked around awhile, and then went away
IN the direction from which they came