A few minutes after the 'coon hunters had gone a big boy, and a little
girl with a tear-stained face, who had come from a house just beyond
the corn-field, reached the spot, to which they had been attracted by
the firelight. As they did so, the child uttered a cry of joy, sprang
to the water-oak, and caught up a frightened-looking little black and
white kitten that was cautiously descending the big trunk backward.
To this day the outcome of that 'coon hunt remains a sealed mystery to
poor Solon, while Bim has never been invited to go on another.
CHAPTER XXXVIII.
THE GREAT RIVER AND ITS MISCHIEF.
The scenery amid which the good raft _Venture_ performed its long and
eventful voyage changed almost with the rapidity of a kaleidoscope, but
was ever fascinating and full of pleasant surprises. The flaming
autumnal foliage of the forest-lined banks through which the first
hundred miles or so were made, gave way to masses of sombre browns or
rich purples, and these in turn to the flecked white of cotton-fields,
the dark green of live-oaks, and the silver gray of Spanish moss. The
picturesque cliffs of the upper river, rising in places to almost
mountainous heights, were merged into the lowlands of canebrakes and
swamps, broken by ranges of bluffs along the eastern bank after the
Ohio was passed.
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