y having been
brought up in the dear town o' Auld Reekie, where barrel-organ music is,
as it were, crammed down one's throat without permission being asked or
received, and even, indeed, where it is decidedly objected to.
Everybody said, too, that barrel-organs were a nuisance, and of course I
believed them; so that I left my home with a decided dislike to
barrel-organs in general. Four years' residence, however, in the bush
had rendered me much less fastidious in music, as well as in many other
things; and during the two last years spent at York Factory, not a
solitary note of melody had soothed my longing ear, so that it was with
a species of rapture that I now ground away at the handle of this organ,
which happened to be a very good one, and played in perfect tune. "God
Save the Queen," "Rule Britannia," "Lord McDonald's Reel," and the "Blue
Bells of Scotland" were played over and over again; and, old and
threadbare though they be, to me they were replete with endearing
associations, and sounded like the well-known voices of long, long
absent friends. I spent indeed a delightful evening; and its pleasures
were the more enhanced from the circumstance of its being the first,
after a banishment of two years, which I had spent in the society of the
fair sex.

Next morning was fine, though the wind blew pretty fresh, and we started
before breakfast, having taken leave of the family the night before.
This was the 1st of July. We had been eight days on the route, which is
rather a long time for a canoe to take to reach Oxford House; but as
most of the portages were now over, we calculated upon arriving at
Norway House in two or three days.

In the afternoon the wind blew again, and obliged us to encamp on a
small island, where we remained all day. While there, a couple of
Indians visited us, and gave us an immense trout in exchange for some
pemmican. This trout I neglected to measure, but I am convinced it was
more than three feet long and half a foot broad: it was very good, and
we made a capital dinner off it. During the day, as it was very warm, I
had a delightful swim in the lake, on the lee of the island.

The wind moderated a little in the evening, and we again embarked,
making up for lost time by travelling till midnight, when we put ashore
and went to sleep without making a fire or taking any supper. About
four o'clock we started again, and in a couple of hours came to the end
of Oxford Lake, after which