forcible protests against the weather. There was nothing to be
done but to sit with my feet tucked up and my arms around my knees,
occupying thus the smallest possible space for one of my proportions,
and wait developments. Ten minutes later, after much shouting outside
my window, a ladder was planted against the car, and two trainmen in
yellow oilskins climbed to the roof. I noted with satisfaction that
they carried hammers, tacks, and strips of tin. A series of resounding
blows and the almost immediate cessation of the descending floods told
how effective their methods had proved. Directly afterwards the
startled squeak of the engine whistle, as if some one had trodden on
its toe, warned us that we were off once more.

We landed (you will note that the nautical phraseology of the country
has already gripped me) in the same storm at Come-by-Chance Junction.
But the next morning broke bright and shining, as if rain and wind
were inhabitants of another planet. It is quite obvious that this land
is a lineal descendant of Albion's Isle. Now I am aboard the coastal
steamer and we are nosing our way gingerly through the packed floe
ice, as we steam slowly north for Cape St. John. Yes, I know it is
Midsummer's Day, but as the captain tersely put it, "the slob is a bit
late."

The storm of two days ago blowing in from the broad Atlantic drove the
great field of leftover pans before it, and packed them tight against
the cliffs. If we had not had that sudden change in the weather's mind
yesterday, we should not be even as far along as we now find
ourselves.

You can form no idea of one's sensations as the steamer pushes her way
through an ice jam. For miles around, as far as the eye can reach,
the sea is covered with huge, glistening blocks. Sometimes the
deep-blue water shows between, and sometimes they are so tightly
massed together that they look like a hummocky white field. How any
one can get a steamer along through it is a never-ending source of
amazement, and my admiration for the captain is unstinted. I stand on
the bridge by the hour, and watch him and listen to the reports of the
man on the cross-trees as to the prospects of "leads" of open water
ahead. Every few minutes we back astern, and then butt the ice. If one
stays below decks the noise of the grinding on the ship's side is so
persistent and so menacing that I prefer the deck in spite of its
barrels and crates and boxes and smells. Here at least one would not