and beauty, as well as fitness and
judgment, as to give her an appearance that even Mabel at once distinguished to
be gallant and trim. Her mould was admirable, for a wright of great skill had
sent her drafts from England at the express request of the officer who had
caused her to be constructed; her paint dark, warlike and neat, and the long
coach-whip pennant that she wore, at once proclaimed her to be the property of
the king. Her name was the Scud.
    »That, then, is the vessel of Jasper!« said Mabel, who associated the master
of the little craft quite naturally with the cutter itself. »Are there many
others on this lake?«
    »The Frenchers have three; one of which they tell me is a real ship, such as
are used on the ocean, another a brig, and a third is a cutter, like the Scud,
here, which they call the Squirrel, in their own tongue howsever, and which
seems to have a nat'ral hatred of our own pretty boat, for Jasper seldom goes
out that the Squirrel is not at his heels.«
    »And is Jasper one to run from a Frenchman though he appear in the shape of
a squirrel, and that, too, on the water!«
    »Of what use would valor be without the means of turning it to account?
Jasper is a brave boy, as all on this frontier know, but he has no gun except a
little howitzer, and then his crew consists only of two men besides himself and
a boy. I was with him in one of his trampooses, and the youngster was risky
enough, for he brought us so near the inimy that rifles began to talk, but the
Frenchers carry cannon, and ports, and never show their faces outside of
Frontenac, without having some twenty men, besides their Squirrel, in their
cutter. No - no - this Scud was built for flying, and the Major says he will not
put her in a fighting humour, by giving her men and arms lest she should take
him at his word, and get her wings clipped. I know little of these things, for
my gifts are not at all, in that way, but I see the reason of the thing - I see
its reason, though Jasper does not.«
    »Ah! here is my uncle, none the worse for his swim, coming to look at this
inland sea.«
    Sure enough Cap, who had announced his approach by a couple of lusty hems,
now made his appearance on the