r
than with the pig. "Continue," I said--"continue, my boy. Miss Miller
must have said more than that to reform you."

"Truly," replied Pat. "On the second day we were making the lunch at
midday on the island below the first rapids. I smoked the pipe on a
rock apart, after the collation. Mees Meelair comes to me, and says:
'Patrique, my man, do you comprehend that the tobacco is a poison?
You are committing the murder of yourself.' Then she tells me many
things--about the nicoline, I think she calls him; how he goes into the
blood and into the bones and into the hair, and how quickly he will kill
the cat. And she says, very strong, 'The men who smoke the tobacco shall
die!'"

"That must have frightened you well, Pat. I suppose you threw away your
pipe at once."

"But no, m'sieu'; this time I continue to smoke, for now it is Mees
Meelair who comes near the pipe voluntarily, and it is not my offence.
And I remember, while she is talking, the old bonhomme Michaud St.
Gerome. He is a capable man; when he was young he could carry a barrel
of flour a mile without rest, and now that he has seventy-three years he
yet keeps his force. And he smokes--it is astonishing how that old man
smokes! All the day, except when he sleeps. If the tobacco is a poison,
it is a poison of the slowest--like the tea or the coffee. For the cat
it is quick--yes; but for the man it is long; and I am still young--only
thirty-one.

"But the third day, m'sieu'--the third day was the worst. It was a day
of sadness, a day of the bad chance. The demoiselle Meelair was not
content but that we should leap the Rapide des Cedres in canoe. It was
rough, rough--all feather-white, and the big rock at the corner boiling
like a kettle. But it is the ignorant who have the most of boldness. The
demoiselle Meelair she was not solid in the canoe. She made a jump and a
loud scream. I did my possible, but the sea was too high. We took in of
the water about five buckets. We were very wet. After that we make the
camp; and while I sit by the fire to dry my clothes I smoke for comfort.

"Mees Meelair she comes to me once more. 'Patrique,' she says with a sad
voice, 'I am sorry that a nice man, so good, so brave, is married to a
thing so bad, so sinful!' At first I am mad when I hear this, because
I think she means Angelique, my wife; but immediately she goes on:
'You are married to the smoking. That is sinful; it is a wicked thing.
Christians do not smoke. There is non