Camping in the Winter Woods: Adventures of Two Boys in the Maine Woods

As the train stopped before a small station built of logs, two boys carrying guns and rods sprang from their seats and hurried out into the fragrant, pine-laden air of northern Maine. They were Edward Williams and his friend, George Rand. They waved their hands to the conductor as he swung himself back upon the train, and then they turned to face a vast forest which seemed to surround the tiny station on every side.

As they were too young to enter college until the following year, the lads had been sent to spend the fall and winter in the Maine woods. Their fathers, both outdoor enthusiasts, whose boyhood days had been passed on a farm, believed that a taste of pioneer life would strengthen the boys for their life-work. They would be thrown largely upon their own resources, and their parents hoped that the results would justify the experiment. It was to be a new venture in education—a course for the building of clean, self-reliant manhood.

Ed and George were accordingly intrusted to the care and tutorage of Ben Adams, a tried and trusted old woodsman, who had guided their fathers for many years. Ben was told to teach them whatever he considered it necessary for them to know. They had their text-books, also, and a tutor was to keep in touch by letter. So at the end of a two days’ journey we find the city boys standing curiously on the threshold of a new world.

Suddenly a friendly voice called to them, and turning, they saw a figure which seemed to belong to the forests.

“Well, boys, you got here all right, eh?”

They looked up to see a tall, gray-haired man dressed in corduroys smiling down at them. His face was tanned and kindly, and his keen, penetrating dark eyes looked at them approvingly; for he winked at the young station agent, who had just greeted him, and nodded toward the lads.