ever alike, and every curve in the river bank
brought a fresh vista. I never tired of the vast, silent forests that
seemed to shut us in, nor of the dancing silver of the swift water
under our keel, nor of the great rocky bluffs under whose grim shadows
we found passage. To me the hardships even were enjoyable: the
clambering over rough portages, the occasional mishap, the coarse
fare, the nights I was compelled to pass in the canoe, these only
served to give added zest to the great adventure, to make real the
unusual experiences I was passing through.

I was scarce more than a girl, young, strong, little accustomed to
luxury, and my heart responded to the exhilaration of constant change,
and the thrill of peril. And when, at last, we made the long portage,
tramping through the dark forest aisles, bearing on our shoulders
heavy loads, scarcely able to see the sun even at midday through the
leafy screen of leaves, and came forth at twilight on the shores of
the mighty lake, no words can express the raptures with which I stood
and gazed across that expanse of heaving, restless water. The men
launched their canoes upon the surface, and made camp in the edge of
the forest, but I could not move, could not restrain my eyes, until
darkness descended and left all before me a void.

Never had I gazed upon so vast a spectacle, so somber in the dull gray
light, stretching afar to the horizon, its wild, desolate silence
adding to its awful majesty. Even when darkness enshrouded it all, the
memory haunted me, and I could but think and dream, frightened and
awed in presence of that stupendous waste of waters. The soldiers sang
about their fires, and Cassion sought me with what he meant to be
courteous words, but I was in no spirit to be amused. For hours I lay
alone, listening to the dull roar of waves along the shore, and the
wind in the trees. De Artigny, and his party, camped just beyond us,
across the mouth of a narrow stream, but I saw nothing of him, nor do
I believe I gave his presence a thought.

It was scarcely more than daybreak when we broke camp, and headed our
canoes out into the lake. With the dawn, and the glint of sunlight
over the waters, much of my dread departed, and I could appreciate the
wild song of delight with which our Indian paddlers bent to their
work. The sharp-prowed canoes swept through the waters swiftly, no
longer battling against a current, and the shore line ever in view was
fascinating in its gre