"Woodcraft" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... to take care of their wounded bodies, in their reading of the weather and in all forms of woodcraft, animals undoubtedly possess superhuman powers. Even squirrels can prophesy an unusually long and severe winter and thus make adequate preparations. Some animals act as both barometers and thermometers. It is claimed that while frogs remain yellow, only fair weather ...
— The Human Side of Animals • Royal Dixon
... that here to land are come? All thirteen of body very keen. By him that made me, so fair a band saw I at no time; say what ye seek?" Horn tells his story, and Aylmar likes him, and bids Athelbrus, his steward, teach him woodcraft, and the harp and song, and also to carve ...
— Anglo-Saxon Literature • John Earle
... man and in escaping from him that thus far, so far as we are aware, no white man has ever shot one! The native hunters take them only in pitfalls or in nooses. Mr. Herbert Lang, of the American Museum of Natural History, diligently hunted the okapi, with native aid, but in spite of all his skill in woodcraft the cunning of the okapi was so great, and the brushy woods were so great a handicap to him, that he never shot ...
— The Minds and Manners of Wild Animals • William T. Hornaday
... in all pertaining to woodcraft was much broader and more sympathetic than that of his companion, Jabe's interpretation of the sound of the falling tree had seemed hasty and shallow. He knew that there was no better all-round woodsman in these countries than Jabe Smith; but ...
— The House in the Water - A Book of Animal Stories • Charles G. D. Roberts
... performed, the varlets of the kennel having cut down a great heap of green branches, and strewn them on the ground, laid the hart upon them, on his back, and then bore him to an open space in the wood, where he was broken up by the King, who prided himself upon his skill in all matters of woodcraft. While this office was in course of execution a bowl of wine was poured out for the monarch, which he took, adverting, as he did so, to the common superstition, that if a huntsman should break up a deer without drinking, the venison would putrefy. ...
— The Lancashire Witches - A Romance of Pendle Forest • William Harrison Ainsworth
... at the beginning of their flight. They plunged deeper into the forest; no one spoke; only the crackling under foot and certain wood sounds broke the stillness. Unfortunately the soil was soft so that their footprints might be followed by any one versed in woodcraft. At times they were forced to skirt unusually thick places, but in spite of these deviations Mr. Heatherbloom was enabled generally to keep to their course by consulting a small compass he had found in the boat. It was essential ...
— A Man and His Money • Frederic Stewart Isham
... old books showed the way of it! What meant old poets by their strictures? And when old poets had said their say of it, 230 How taught old painters in their pictures? We must revert to the proper channels, Workings in tapestry, paintings on panels, And gather up woodcraft's authentic traditions: Here was food for our various ambitions, 235 As on each case, exactly stated— To encourage your dog, now, the properest chirrup, Or best prayer to Saint Hubert on mounting your stirrup— We of the household took thought and debated. Blessed was ...
— Selections from the Poems and Plays of Robert Browning • Robert Browning
... south. When the sun was squarely overhead, pouring down a flood of golden beams, he paused in the shade of a mighty oak, and took food from his belt. He might have eaten there in silence and obscurity, but once more the shiftless one showed a singular lack of caution and woodcraft. He drew together dry sticks, ignited a fire with flint and steel, and cooked deer meat over it. He let the fire burn high, and a thin column of dark smoke rose far up into the blue. Any savage, roaming the wilderness, ...
— The Free Rangers - A Story of the Early Days Along the Mississippi • Joseph A. Altsheler
... herdsman left Daniel much time to himself. He spent this time in studying woodcraft. He grew passionately fond of everything belonging to the wilderness; he knew birds and beasts, the trails through the forest and the course of streams as well as any Indian. He set traps of his own making, and brought his captures proudly home at ...
— Historic Boyhoods • Rupert Sargent Holland
... would only upturn, but would spare those whose strength had resisted the attack. Magnificent trees lie rotting upon the ground in thousands upon thousands, untouched since the hour when they fell before the most scientifically applied axe. I never saw a higher example of woodcraft. The trunks of pines two feet in diameter are cut so carefully, that the work of the axe is almost as neat as that of a cross-cut saw. These large trees are divided about four feet from the ground, as that is a convenient height for the woodman, and spare ...
— Cyprus, as I Saw it in 1879 • Sir Samuel W. Baker
... him a certain boyishness that required her womanly care, and even induced her to offer to accompany him to the cross-roads when the time for his departure arrived. With her superior knowledge of woodcraft and the locality, she would have kept him from being lost. I wot not but that she would have protected him from bears or wolves, but chiefly, I think, from the feline fascinations of Mame Robinson and Lucy Rance, who might be lying in wait for this tender young poet. Nor ...
— Tales of the Argonauts • Bret Harte
... adepts in the art of cookery, and—one of them at least—in woodcraft, it was not long before a large fire was blazing under a convenient fir-tree, and the grey goose soon hissed pleasantly in front of it. They were a quiet and self-contained couple, however, and went about their work in profound silence. Not that they lacked ...
— The Walrus Hunters - A Romance of the Realms of Ice • R.M. Ballantyne
... might as well have lain flat under the peeled wand like the others," I thought, and then the reason for its position flashed on me. It was with just a touch of vanity I said to my friend, "A little coueging may be of some use at woodcraft too, if it sharpens Elrigmore's wits enough to read the signs that Barbreck's eagle eye can find nothing in. I could tell the very ...
— John Splendid - The Tale of a Poor Gentleman, and the Little Wars of Lorn • Neil Munro
... was his first visit to the colony since he had left it four months before. His companion, Boduoc, was one of the tribesmen, a young man six years his senior. He was related to his mother, and had been his companion in his childish days, teaching him woodcraft, and to throw the javelin and use the sword. Together, before Beric went as hostage, they had wandered through the forest and hunted the wolf and wild boar, and at that time Boduoc had stood in the relation of an elder brother ...
— Beric the Briton - A Story of the Roman Invasion • G. A. Henty
... possession of by colossal legs and feet. This singular deformity made him the best hunter in his tribe. He tracked game with a sweep of great beams as tireless as the tread of a modern steamer. The little sense in his head was woodcraft. He thought of nothing ...
— The Chase Of Saint-Castin And Other Stories Of The French In The New World • Mary Hartwell Catherwood
... surpassed even the seasoned savages in strength and endurance. On the shore of the Georgian Bay, however, his guide at length abandoned him. But Brebeuf had been here in a former year, and his instinctive woodcraft guided him twenty miles through the forest to the palisaded village ...
— Old Quebec - The Fortress of New France • Sir Gilbert Parker and Claude Glennon Bryan
... idle while talking. The canoe was soon made fast, and then they resumed their hunt for the estray. They were not skillful enough in woodcraft to trace the animal through the forest by the means that an Indian would have used, but they were hopeful that by taking a general direction they would soon find her. If she still had the bell tied around her neck, there was no ...
— The Hunters of the Ozark • Edward S. Ellis
... good. We shall find methods of making you talk. You have been among the Indians and you ought to know something about these methods. But first I must lecture you on your lack of woodcraft. It is exceedingly unwise to build a fire in the wilderness and go to sleep beside it, unless there is someone with you to watch. I'm ashamed of you, Monsieur Garay, to have neglected such an elementary lesson. It made your capture easy, so ridiculously easy that it lacked ...
— The Masters of the Peaks - A Story of the Great North Woods • Joseph A. Altsheler
... the Wandering Jew. The contents—of this sack would have furnished a modern industrial exhibition, provisions cooked and raw, blankets, maple-sugar, tinware, clothing, pork, Indian meal, flour, coffee, tea, &c. Phelps was the ideal guide: he knew every foot of the pathless forest; he knew all woodcraft, all the signs of the weather, or, what is the same thing, how to make a Delphic prediction about it. He was fisherman and hunter, and had been the comrade of sportsmen and explorers; and his enthusiasm for the beauty and sublimity of the region, and for its ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... active and armed tail; and his face would have straightway been transformed into a sort of anguished pincushion, stuck full of piercing, finely barbed quills. He would have paid dear for his ignorance of woodcraft,—perhaps with the loss of an eye, or even with starvation from a quill working through into his gullet. But fortunately for him the ewe understood the peculiarities of porcupines. Just in time she noted his danger, and rudely butted him ...
— The Watchers of the Trails - A Book of Animal Life • Charles G. D. Roberts
... who escaped unharmed to Fort Littleton. When James was sixteen years of age he served with his brother William on Forbes's campaign, and very likely saw further service during that war. In 1772, when he had attained wide celebrity on the border as an adept in woodcraft, he helped William settle on Ten Mile Creek, a tributary of the Monongahela; and in 1773 he and several other explored Kentucky, returning home by way of Greenbrier River. We have seen (p. 152, note) that he was surveying the site of Harrodsburg in 1774, when warned by Boone and Stoner. Retiring ...
— Chronicles of Border Warfare • Alexander Scott Withers
... all his consummate woodcraft into play to determine how much time had passed since the party rode over this ground. He figured that it must have been on the previous day, though such conclusion did not fully accord with what was told him by the chieftain Amokeat. ...
— Deerfoot in The Mountains • Edward S. Ellis
... with her house building and her hunting, to which was added an occasional spice of excitement contributed by roving lions. To the woodcraft that she had learned from Tarzan, that master of the art, was added a considerable store of practical experience derived from her own past adventures in the jungle and the long months with Obergatz, nor was any day now lacking in some added store of useful knowledge. To these facts was attributable ...
— Tarzan the Terrible • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... and vigour under Foreman Johnston's strict and energetic management. He was admirably suited for his difficult position. His grave, reserved manner rendered impossible that familiarity which is so apt to breed contempt, while his thorough mastery of all the secrets of woodcraft, his great physical strength, and his absolute fearlessness in the face of any peril, combined to make him a fit master for the strangely-assorted half-hundred of men now under his sole control. Frank held him in profound respect, and would have endured almost anything ...
— The Young Woodsman - Life in the Forests of Canada • J. McDonald Oxley
... are exquisite in their refinement, and yet robust in their appreciation of some of the rougher phases of woodcraft. "This is a book full of delight. An additional charm lies in Mr. Bull's faithful and graphic illustrations, which in fashion all their own tell the story of the wild life, illuminating and supplementing the pen pictures of ...
— Conjuror's House - A Romance of the Free Forest • Stewart Edward White
... Sometimes they took long walks together on the mountains. This was contrary to mountain etiquette, but they were remote even from the rude conventionalities of the life below them. They even went hunting together, and Easter had the joy of a child when she discovered her superiority to Clayton in woodcraft and in the use of a rifle. If he could tell her the names of plants and flowers they found, and how they were akin, she could show him where they grew. If he could teach her a little more about animals and their habits than she already knew, he had ...
— A Mountain Europa • John Fox Jr.
... is given by Bennet Woodcraft in his Sketch of the Origin and Progress of Steam Navigation, ...
— Men of Invention and Industry • Samuel Smiles
... her teens, half the young bloods of the neighbourhood were courting around Uncle Johnnie's house. But none of them ever made any headway, for Uncle Johnnie clung to his one ewe lamb with almost childish dependence, and guarded her with all the wiles of his lifelong woodcraft. ...
— Labrador Days - Tales of the Sea Toilers • Wilfred Thomason Grenfell
... same manes?" asked Mickey, who was gradually accumulating a wonderful faith in the woodcraft ...
— The Cave in the Mountain • Lieut. R. H. Jayne
... others, Malachi and the rest with him halted, that Henry and Percival might come up with them, and then, after they had recovered their breath a little, he said, "Now, you see there's a fine lot of deer here, Master Percival, but as you know nothing about woodcraft, and may put us all out, observe what I say to you. The animals are not only cute of hearing and seeing, but they are more cute of smell, and they can scent a man a mile off if the wind blows down to them; so you see it would ...
— The Settlers in Canada • Frederick Marryat
... was half fearful, and therefore some of her inherent woodcraft deserted her, so much so that not noting a tuft of ferns which uprose almost at her heels, she stepped quickly back, stumbled, and Fawkes had his arms ...
— The Orchard of Tears • Sax Rohmer
... are exquisite in their refinement, and yet robust in their appreciation of some of the rougher phases of woodcraft. Among the many writers about animals, Mr. Roberts ...
— The Passenger from Calais • Arthur Griffiths
... behind him; for the fat scout never so much as dreamed that there was such a thing as covering his trail; nor would he have known of any reason for doing anything like this had he been so far up in woodcraft. ...
— The, Boy Scouts on Sturgeon Island - or Marooned Among the Game-fish Poachers • Herbert Carter
... towards the point where Lachine lay. All that went to make the life of a Company's man possible was there; and there, too, were those with whom I had tented and travelled for three long months,—eaten with them, cared for them, used for them all the woodcraft that I knew. I could not think that it would be a young man's lifetime before I set eyes on that scene again. Never from that day to this have I seen the broad, sweet river where I spent the three ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... the touch of romance. When he first found Fenimore Cooper's books, he drank them in as one parched might drink at a spring. He reveled in the tales of courage and heroic deeds, he gloated over records of their trailing and scouting by red man and white; he gloried in their woodcraft, and lived it all in imagination, secretly blaming the writer, a little, for praising without describing it so it could be followed. "Some day," he said, "I shall put it all down for other boys ...
— Boy Scouts Handbook - The First Edition, 1911 • Boy Scouts of America
... Heaven's blue vault for a canopy, let us forget the petty annoyances which have in a measure marred our first day. Did I say marred? No; not that—for these things should be but object lessons teaching us to profit by them, to perfect ourselves in woodcraft. So let us be ...
— Fibble, D. D. • Irvin Shrewsbury Cobb
... last that was said about trailing the Wild Hunter for some time to come, but meanwhile we built a more or less open faced permanent camp and Big Pete initiated me into mysteries of real woodcraft, for it was up to us now to live on the ...
— The Black Wolf Pack • Dan Beard
... presented it to Wyat. Several large leafy branches being gathered and laid upon the ground, the hart was placed upon them, and Herne commenced breaking him up, as the process of dismembering the deer is termed in the language of woodcraft. His first step was to cut off the animal's head, which he performed by a single blow with ...
— Windsor Castle • William Harrison Ainsworth
... in view he crossed over to the Nelson {46} and ascended it until he reached a high clearing on its left bank, near which grew an abundance of white spruce. He brought up a body of men, most of whom now received their first lesson in woodcraft. The pale and flaky-barked aromatic spruce trees were felled and stripped of their branches. Next, the logs were 'snaked' into the open, where the dwellings were to be erected, and hewed into proper shape. These timbers were then deftly fitted together and the four walls of a rude ...
— The Red River Colony - A Chronicle of the Beginnings of Manitoba • Louis Aubrey Wood
... was Old Bill, the hunter, who had done little besides hunting and trapping all his long life; even these did not begin to know the beasts and birds as little Luke knew them. Before the Finding of the Magic Flower, he had thought them marvels of woodcraft and fieldcraft. Now they seemed to him almost blind ...
— The Magic Speech Flower - or Little Luke and His Animal Friends • Melvin Hix
... stall-feeding. Clara sat by listening, and perceived that Will Belton would soon be allowed to do just what he pleased with the place. Her father talked as she had not heard him talk since her poor brother's death, and was quite animated on the subject of woodcraft. 'We don't know much about timber down where I am,' said Will, 'just because ...
— The Belton Estate • Anthony Trollope
... the other boat, was also using his knowledge of woodcraft to some purpose. When it happened that the two skiffs came alongside he called out to Elmer, as if to settle some point he ...
— Afloat - or, Adventures on Watery Trails • Alan Douglas
... might have been made from willow bark "after the manner of the Indians," and describe other means of securing food that they claim men familiar with woodcraft would have resorted to. The preceding chapters show how impracticable it would have been for us to have consumed our small stock of provisions while manufacturing a fish-net from bark; and how we did resort ...
— The Lure of the Labrador Wild • Dillon Wallace
... young man was an apt scholar, was now the order of the day. Tiburcio was an artist in woodcraft as well as in his knowledge of the habits of animals and birds. On chilly or disagreeable days they would take out the pack of dogs and beat the thickets for the javeline. It was exciting sport to bring to bay a drove of these animals. ...
— Cattle Brands - A Collection of Western Camp-fire Stories • Andy Adams
... was a marvellous piece of woodcraft, if such it may be called, on the part of the pony, that he should have struck the spot so accurately, and yet it is scarcely less marvellous that, had he needed direction, his master was competent to give it, despite the ...
— The Young Ranchers - or Fighting the Sioux • Edward S. Ellis
... stipulated that they should travel light—with only a pack burro to carry their supplies—and that they should avoid the haunts of the summer resorters, and keep to the more unfrequented trails. The novelist's acquaintance with the country into which they would go, and his experience in woodcraft—gained upon many like expeditions in the lonely wilds he loved—would make a guide unnecessary. It would be a new experience for Aaron King; and, as the novelist talked, he found himself eager as a schoolboy for the trip; while the distant mountains, ...
— The Eyes of the World • Harold Bell Wright
... to know them well. That great copper-ruffed cock was becoming famous up and down the valley. During the Gunner Moon many a one had tried to end his splendid life, just as a worthless wretch of old sought fame by burning the Ephesian wonder of the world. But Redruff was deep in woodcraft. He knew just where to hide, and when to rise on silent wing, and when to squat till overstepped, then rise on thunder wing within a yard to shield himself at once behind some ...
— Lobo, Rag and Vixen - Being The Personal Histories Of Lobo, Redruff, Raggylug & Vixen • Ernest Seton-Thompson
... refused to ponder in the present. She was doing it, and the physical act had its fascination. Her ears, attuned to all the sounds of the lonely forest, caught them and arranged them according to her knowledge of woodcraft. ...
— To the Last Man • Zane Grey
... that these who walked by faith likewise gathered themselves into great companies, and each company followed some leader. Some of these leaders had the gift of woodcraft, and saw clearly into the very nature of things. But some were only headstrong, and these proved to be but blind leaders ...
— The Story of the Innumerable Company, and Other Sketches • David Starr Jordan
... and the girl were plainly glad to hurry away, and Geoffrey waited until the sound of their footsteps became scarcely audible before he heeded a faint rustling which indicated that somebody with a knowledge of woodcraft was forcing a passage through the undergrowth. He broke a dry twig at intervals as he walked slowly for a little distance. Then he dropped on hands and knees to cross a strip of open sward at an angle to his previous course, and lay still in the black shadow of a spruce. It was evident that somebody ...
— Thurston of Orchard Valley • Harold Bindloss
... other game, and shared the profits arising from their hunting and trapping. What with the knowledge they thus picked up themselves, and the instruction given them by Peter Piper and others, there were no two boys in Connecticut better versed in woodcraft. ...
— Far Past the Frontier • James A. Braden
... Indian youth, whom he had driven from his door when he asked for shelter, and he knew he had been the companion of his boy on the stirring journey from Kentucky to Louisiana. It mattered not that the masterful woodcraft of the dusky friend had saved the life of Otto Relstaub; all that the German remembered was that the valuable horse was lost, and he blamed this Indian for it, as he censured Jack Carleton for the same misfortune. The man, however, said nothing for ...
— Camp-fire and Wigwam • Edward Sylvester Ellis
... indispensable. Tom O'Hara turned ranger from pure love for the wild, adventurous life; and, despite the natural defects to which we have referred, possessed accomplishments that rendered him a most valuable ally and companion. He never had met his superior with the rifle, and his knowledge of woodcraft was such that, although he had spent ten years on the border, his slowness of foot had never operated against him; nor once had he been outwitted by the red-men of the woods. Besides this, he had the enviable reputation of being a lucky ...
— The Riflemen of the Miami • Edward S. Ellis
... become a part Of his own life—always he spoke their tongue, He dwelt within their tents—with all his heart He learned their ancient woodcraft, and each art Their race had practised when the ...
— The Miracle and Other Poems • Virna Sheard
... to clearing a space for corn and potatoes. In the meantime he maintained his family entirely by his rifle, and I soon found him to be a first-rate huntsman. Under his tutelage I received my first effective lessons in 'woodcraft.' ...
— The Crayon Papers • Washington Irving
... out his knife he fell to work, and while he tied green withes, as if the task were father to the thought, he told her something of a sojourn among the Indians, of whom he had learned much concerning their woodcraft, arts, and superstitions; lengthening the legend till the little canoe was ready for another launch. With her fancy full of war-trails and wampum, Sylvia followed to the river-side, and as they floated back dabbled her stained fingers in the water, comforting their smart with its cool flow till ...
— Moods • Louisa May Alcott
... But he knew that, when last he looked, the track of the herd had been straight down the middle of the ever-widening barren. By now he must be a good two miles from the nearest cover; and he knew well enough that, in the bewilderment of the storm, which blunted even such woodcraft as his, and blurred not only his vision, but every other sense as well, he could never find his way. His only hope was to keep to the trail of the caribou. The beasts would either lie down or circle to ...
— The Backwoodsmen • Charles G. D. Roberts
... a few seconds or a minute, depending upon skill and other conditions, a fire was obtained. It is interesting to note how civilized man is often compelled by necessity to adopt the methods of primitive beings. The rubbing of sticks is an emergency measure of the master of woodcraft at the present time, and the production of fire in this manner is the proud accomplishment or ambition of ...
— Artificial Light - Its Influence upon Civilization • M. Luckiesh
... cradled in woodcraft, had heard plainly a man creeping through the underbrush beside us. Fear of the Congo chief and pity for the wretch tore at my heart. Suddenly there loomed in front of us, on the path, a great, naked man. We stood with useless limbs, ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... not less, but more authority, and has called in new instructors to carry on the boy's education: real Adirondack guides—old Sam Dunning and one-eyed Enos, the last and laziest of the Saranac Indians. Better men will be discovered for later trips, but none more amusing, and none whose woodcraft seems more wonderful than that of this queerly matched team, as they make the first camp in a pelting rain-storm on the shore of Big Clear Pond. The pitching of the tents is a lesson in architecture, the building of the camp-fire a victory over damp nature, and the ...
— Little Rivers - A Book Of Essays In Profitable Idleness • Henry van Dyke
... semi-civilised peoples. A Mexican peon will not miss his way on the plains or in the mountains—the least indication will serve his recollection of the route, and, indeed, it is not necessary to enlarge upon the aborigine's natural science of woodcraft. Moreover, the peon will carry any delicate object—a theodolite or barometer, or other scientific instrument, for example—with such care over the roughest and most precipitous places that it will never be injured, and where ...
— Mexico • Charles Reginald Enock
... woodsman," she argued, "and also he must suppose that we are more or less familiar with American woodcraft, and fairly well versed in its signs. Yet—he has left no sign that we could understand where a Hun ...
— In Secret • Robert W. Chambers
... must be borne in mind, however, in recalling the two expeditions. In the former Jack and Otto were the actors, but now the hunters were Jack and Deerfoot, and therein lay all the difference in the world. Well aware of the wonderful woodcraft of the young warrior, his courage and devotion to his friends, the parent had little if any misgivings, when she kissed her boy good-by, and saw him enter the wilderness in the company of the ...
— Footprints in the Forest • Edward Sylvester Ellis
... centers around the making and the enjoying of a mountain camp, spiced with the fun of a lively troop of Girl Scouts. The charm of living in the woods, of learning woodcraft of all sorts, of adventuring into the unknown, combine to make a busy and an exciting ...
— Polly and Eleanor • Lillian Elizabeth Roy
... breech-loading rifle, and insisted on shooting an old-fashioned, muzzle-loading, single-barrel rifle, made by a fellow townsman, Henry Slaughterbach. It was an exceedingly accurate and powerful shooting gun. Chauvin was a thorough hunter, well versed in woodcraft, up in camp equipage and the requirements of men on a two or three ...
— Out of Doors—California and Oregon • J. A. Graves
... Max," remarked Steve; "wish I knew as much as you do about traveling through the woods, and the things a fellow is apt to meet up with there. The more I hear you tell, the more I make up my mind I'm going to take lessons in woodcraft; but I never seem ...
— The Strange Cabin on Catamount Island • Lawrence J. Leslie
... things a boy ought to know. While Mark's knowledge was of books, games, people, and places that seemed to Frank almost like foreign countries, he knew the names of every wild animal, bird, fish, tree, and flower to be found in the surrounding country, and was skilled in all tricks of woodcraft. ...
— Wakulla - A Story of Adventure in Florida • Kirk Munroe
... as the oaks ye cleave, And moved as soon to fear and flight, Men of the glade and forest! leave Your woodcraft for the field of fight. The arms that wield the axe must pour An iron tempest on the foe; His serried ranks shall reel before The arm that lays the ...
— The American Union Speaker • John D. Philbrick
... from the tenderfoot class in the shortest possible space of time. Any scout may do this by being diligent in the pursuit of various lines of woodcraft. ...
— The Banner Boy Scouts - Or, The Struggle for Leadership • George A. Warren
... untrodden woods and leafy aisles, whose floors of moss or bark were undisturbed by human footprint, were a keen delight and novelty. More than this, his quick eye, trained perceptions, and frontier knowledge now stood him in good stead. His intuitive sense of distance, instincts of woodcraft, and his unerring detection of those signs, landmarks, and guideposts of nature, undistinguishable to aught but birds and beasts and some children, were now of the greatest service to his less favored companion. In this part of their strange pilgrimage it was the boy who took ...
— A Waif of the Plains • Bret Harte
... proceeded to a picturesque point which jutted into the lake below Chazy Landing, and was sheltered by a grove of trees into which we hauled the Mayeta. Bodfish's woodcraft enabled him to construct a wigwam out of rails and rubber blankets, where we quietly resided until Monday morning. The owner of the point, Mr. Trombly, invited us to dinner on Sunday, and exhibited samples of a ton of maple sugar ...
— Voyage of The Paper Canoe • N. H. Bishop
... with my scout hat. It wasn't so black when I got it all cleaned off. It was kind of chocolate color and I knew it must be very old, because cedar turns that color after a long time. You learn that in Woodcraft. It was all made out of one piece and the place where you sit was just hollowed out—about big enough for ...
— Roy Blakeley • Percy Keese Fitzhugh
... between the hills, where they had been the other day, but this time no one waited, with breaking heart, behind the rustling screen of leaves. Against the rock, with some simple woodcraft of stones and dry twigs, Alden made a fire, while Edith spread the white cloth that covered Madame's basket and set ...
— Master of the Vineyard • Myrtle Reed
... their lives; indeed, the Wetzels, particularly, knew no other occupation. They had attained a wonderful skill with the rifle; long practice had rendered their senses as acute as those of the fox. Skilled in every variety of woodcraft, with lynx eyes ever on the alert for detecting a trail, or the curling smoke of some camp fire, or the minutest sign of an enemy, these men stole onward through the forest with the cautious but dogged and persistent determination that ...
— Betty Zane • Zane Grey
... that I did not proceed without precautions. Youth though I was, I was an old hunter, and had some knowledge of "woodcraft," gathered in deerstalking, and in the pursuit of other game, among my native hills. Moreover, my nine months of New-world life had not all been passed within city walls; and I had already become initiated into many of the mysteries ...
— The Quadroon - Adventures in the Far West • Mayne Reid
... the northwest were not formidable in numbers, but they were terrible in their ferocity, their knowledge of woodcraft, and their cunning strategy. General Harrison says that for a decade prior to the treaty of Greenville, the allied tribes could not at any time have brought into the field over three thousand warriors. This statement is corroborated ...
— The Land of the Miamis • Elmore Barce
... sight of the church and had turned down the gentian path without meeting any one. He knew enough of woodcraft to break a branch here and turn a stone there to mark his way. The gentians were found, and some had been picked, but Jane answered none of his shouts. He returned the same way until ...
— Some Three Hundred Years Ago • Edith Gilman Brewster
... acquainted with the country that he guided us by a short route towards the camping ground, stealing along between the bushes and trees so quietly and rapidly that, with all my knowledge of woodcraft, I had difficulty in following him and keeping close to his heels. At length we saw the reflection of a camp fire, and then we grew more cautious in our movements, frequently stopping for a few minutes to listen if we could hear other sounds besides our footsteps. ...
— The Gold Hunter's Adventures - Or, Life in Australia • William H. Thomes
... men were children of the sea, superstitious, firm believers in omens, and witchcraft, ready to see the ghosts of the slain, all the more so because they were stained with every crime, then committed so freely under the black flag. He had many advantages, too. He was a master of woodcraft, only their wilderness was ...
— The Sun Of Quebec - A Story of a Great Crisis • Joseph A. Altsheler
... face again, crawling forward with extreme caution. Dalton, close behind him, imitated his comrade. The high grass merely rippled as they passed and the anxious Northern officers walking back and forth were not well enough versed in woodcraft to read from any sign that an ...
— The Scouts of Stonewall • Joseph A. Altsheler
... single outcry in the forest that sounded like the shriek of a creature seized by a carnivore. That was not nearby. He tried to make plans. He felt bitterly self-reproachful that he knew so few of the things that would be useful to a castaway. But he had been a city man all his life. Woodcraft was not only out of his experience—on overcrowded Earth it would ...
— Operation: Outer Space • William Fitzgerald Jenkins
... true account, and if it was wrong—" Esther didn't answer; she gave Charles the halfpenny; he went out, and in a few minutes came back with the paper in his hand. "Tornado first, Ben Jonson second, Woodcraft third," he read out. "That's a good thing for the guv'nor. There was very few what backed Tornado.... He's ...
— Esther Waters • George Moore
... pheasants that provided a little modest November sport. And Helbeck, tying the pony to a tree, went up now with Laura to walk round the woods, showing in all his comments and calculations a great deal of shrewd woodcraft and beastcraft, enough to prove at any rate that the Esau of his race—feras consumere nati, to borrow the emendation of Mr. Fielding—had not yet been wholly cast out by the Jacob of a ...
— Helbeck of Bannisdale, Vol. II • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... was colder by this time and light flurries of snow kept blinding her eyes as she hurried along. However, she had not so forgotten her training in woodcraft as not to recognize signs of Betty's having preceded her along almost the same route; for here and there, where the earth had thawed in the midday warmth, there were impressions of the Princess' shoes. And she even picked up a small crushed handkerchief which had ...
— The Camp Fire Girls in the Outside World • Margaret Vandercook
... concernment yet unpublished therein. I think I will never read any but the commonest books,—the Bible, Homer, Dante, Shakspeare, and Milton. Then we are impatient of so public a life and planet, and run hither and thither for nooks and secrets. The imagination delights in the woodcraft of Indians, trappers, and bee-hunters. We fancy that we are strangers, and not so intimately domesticated in the planet as the wild man and the wild beast and bird. But the exclusion reaches them also; reaches ...
— Essays, Second Series • Ralph Waldo Emerson
... her pace. Her nerves were steadying. Strangely her control was wonderful. There was no real fear in her—only tension. Now as she ran down the open way her eyes were alert for every landmark, and her woodcraft was sufficiently practised to stand her in good stead. She recognized each feature in the path until she came to the point where she had first entered it In a moment she was battling her way through the thick bush, and the tension she was laboring under took her through ...
— The Forfeit • Ridgwell Cullum
... and towering head and shoulders above them all stands the mighty figure of Daniel Boone, the most famous of American pioneers. About him cluster legends and tales innumerable, some true, many false; but one thing is certain; for boldness, cunning and knowledge of woodcraft and Indian warfare ...
— American Men of Action • Burton E. Stevenson
... took the office of guide upon himself, naturally, as the most experienced in woodcraft, and for a mile or two led with confidence; but at length the darkness became intense, and the ...
— The Rival Heirs being the Third and Last Chronicle of Aescendune • A. D. Crake
... man was a master of his own especial art, had done most of their work in cities, and when it came to matters of the fields and woods they were not to be trusted. But when David found Roger a little inclined to vaunt his superior woodcraft he set him a ...
— Masters of the Guild • L. Lamprey
... only served him in the open, in the breaks in the deep woodlands he must thread. For the rest his woodcraft, even his instinct, must serve him. A general line of direction was in his mind. On that alone he must seriously depend. His difficulties were tremendous. They must have been insurmountable for a man of lesser capacity. But the realization of difficulty was a sense he seemed to lack. It was sufficient ...
— The Triumph of John Kars - A Story of the Yukon • Ridgwell Cullum
... as was Jack, he had been thoroughly trained in woodcraft. When beyond sight of the cabins of the straggling settlement, where he made his home, he was as watchful and alert as Daniel Boone or Simon Kenton himself. His penetrating gray eyes not only scanned the sinuous path, ...
— The Lost Trail - I • Edward S. Ellis
... expedition, and excelled on those points in which the other was deficient; for he had been ten years in the interior, in the service of the Northwest Company, and valued himself on his knowledge of "woodcraft," and the strategy of Indian trade and Indian warfare. He had a frame seasoned to toils and hardships; a spirit not to be intimidated, and was reputed to be a "remarkable shot;" which of itself was sufficient to give ...
— Astoria - Or, Anecdotes Of An Enterprise Beyond The Rocky Mountains • Washington Irving
... you, sir. If you are a man who has some woodcraft in your make-up, I say yes. It would ...
— A Woman at Bay - A Fiend in Skirts • Nicholas Carter
... gathered about him, "but you're all good stuff. You have a chance most Boy Scouts don't get. You were all born in the big North Woods. You have inherited instincts that can't be driven into a boy with teaching. You don't have to be taught trailing, or woodcraft, except maybe for an organized way of handling them. You can open old trails as a good turn to the public. You can patrol the woods, report forest fires, and you can fight forest fires, too, as I hear you have been doing. I hear, ...
— The Boy Scouts Book of Stories • Various
... arrival of the messenger was worth more than the emerald ring to us at that moment. He had more woodcraft than Kaipi, who had spent most of his time upon the ocean, and his information regarding the direction in which Leith was now heading saved us many ...
— The White Waterfall • James Francis Dwyer
... the mountain slopes, and had come to a standstill in a place which the boy pretended not to know his way out of. Westover doubted him, for he had found that Jeff liked to give himself credit for woodcraft by discovering an escape from ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... avoid encounter with the inhabitants of the forest. They lit no fires at night, and scarce a word was spoken on the march. Several times they had to take refuge in thickets when they heard the sound of approaching voices, and it needed all their knowledge of woodcraft to maintain their direction steadily towards the north. At last, after six days' journey, they issued out into the open country beyond the forest and ...
— The Dragon and the Raven - or, The Days of King Alfred • G. A. Henty
... Daughters of Rebecca, Knights of Columbus, Knights of Pythias, Ladies of the Maccabees, Loyal Order of Moose, Masonic Orders, Modern Woodmen of America, Royal Neighbors, U. A. O. Druids, Woodmen of the World, Women of Woodcraft. There are four lodge buildings maintained by the Elks, Masons, Odd Fellows and Woodmen of ...
— Reno - A Book of Short Stories and Information • Lilyan Stratton
... in camp that summer, Dick was Tom Sherwood's only rival for the leadership. Already the Otters had held informal discussions of Dick's and Tom's qualifications, but it was still uncertain which of the two would be elected. Each was popular and had a good record in woodcraft, athletics, and scout games. Another question was: Who would be chosen for leader of the Wolf patrol, in the absence of Hugh Hardin and his ...
— The Boy Scouts of the Geological Survey • Robert Shaler
... in the wooded districts of the country of the cave men, for a boy of nine to go a mile from home alone. There was danger lurking in every rod and rood, and, naturally, such a boy would not be versed in all woodcraft, nor have the necessary strength of arm for a long arboreal journey, swinging himself along beneath the intermingling branches of close-standing trees. So this departure was, for Ab, a venture something out of the common. But he was strong for his age, and traversed rapidly a considerable distance ...
— The Story of Ab - A Tale of the Time of the Cave Man • Stanley Waterloo
... sir," replied the mediciner; "would you have me, who know little save of chamber practice, be as skilful of woodcraft as your noble self, or tell hart from hind, doe from roe, in a glade at midnight? I misdoubted me little when I saw the figure run past us to the smith's habitation in the wynd, habited like a morrice dancer; ...
— The Fair Maid of Perth • Sir Walter Scott
... when suddenly they were greeted with the screeches of eighty Iroquois, [ 1 ] who sprang up from their lurking- places, and showered bullets and arrows upon the advancing French. The emergency called, not for chivalry, but for woodcraft; and Maisonneuve ordered his men to take shelter, like their assailants, behind trees. They stood their ground resolutely for a long time; but the Iroquois pressed them close, three of their number were killed, ...
— The Jesuits in North America in the Seventeenth Century • Francis Parkman
... of Atreus, Menelaus, slew Scamandrius, son of Strophius, sportsman keen, In woodcraft skilful; for his practis'd hand Had by Diana's self been taught to slay Each beast of chase the mountain forest holds. But nought avail'd him then the Archer-Queen Diana's counsels, nor his boasted art Of distant aim; for ...
— The Iliad • Homer
... friend, and played with his blond beard and long silken mustache, and took other liberties,—as the helpless are apt to do. And when he had built a fire against a tree, and had shown them other mysteries of woodcraft, their admiration knew no bounds. At the close of two such foolish, idle, happy hours he found himself lying at the feet of the schoolmistress, gazing dreamily in her face as she sat upon the sloping hillside weaving wreaths of laurel and syringa, in very much the same ...
— The Luck of Roaring Camp and Other Tales • Bret Harte |
