After a while, they gave up the search in despair; but
for a long time, a fortnight or three weeks or more, his mother fancied
that she heard the boy's voice in the night, crying, "Father! father!"
One of his little sisters also heard this voice; but people supposed
that the sounds must be those of some wild animal. No more search was
made, and the boy never was found.
But it is not known whether it was the next autumn, or a year or two
after, some hunters came upon traces of the child's wanderings among the
hills, in a different direction from the previous search, and farther
than it was supposed he could have gone. They found some little houses,
such as children build of twigs and sticks of wood, and these the little
fellow had probably built for amusement in his lonesome hours. Nothing,
it seems to me, was ever more strangely touching than this
incident,--his finding time for childish play, while wandering to his
death in these desolate woods,--and then pursuing his way again, till at
last he lay down to die on the dark mountain-side. Finally, on a hill
which E---- pointed out to me, they found a portion of the child's hair
adhering to the overthrown trunk of a tree; and this is all that was
ever found of him.
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