eternity--whether it be a day or a decade in
duration. Next morning, across to the mouth of West River--a place of
many fish and a rocky point for our camp, with deep beds of sweet-fern,
but no trees. That rocky open was not the best selection for tents.
Eddie and his guide had gone up the river a little way when a sudden
shower came up, with heavy darkness and quick wind. Del and I were
stowing a few things inside that were likely to get wet, when all at
once the tents became balloons that were straining at their guy ropes,
and then we were bracing hard and clinging fast to the poles to keep
everything from sailing into the sky.

It was a savage little squall. It laid the bushes down and turned the
lake white in a jiffy. A good thing nobody was out there, under that
black sky. Then the wind died and there came a swish of rain--hard rain
for a few minutes. After that the sun once more, the fragrance of the
fern and the long, sweet afternoon.

Looking at those deep tides of sweet-fern, I had an inspiration. My
stretcher had never been over comfortable. I longed to sleep flat. Why
not a couch of this aromatic balm? It was dry presently, and spreading
the canvas strip smoothly on the ground I covered it with armfuls of the
fern, evenly laid. I gathered and heaped it higher until it rose deep
and cushiony; then I sank down upon it to perfect bliss.

This was Arcady indeed: a couch as soft and as fragrant as any the gods
might have spread by the brooks of Hymettus in that far time when they
stole out of Elysium to find joy in the daughters of men. Such a couch
Leda might have had when the swan came floating down to bestow celestial
motherhood. I buried my face in the odorous mass and vowed that never
again would I cramp myself in a canvas trough between two sticks, and I
never did. I could not get sweet-fern again, but balsam boughs were
plentiful, and properly laid in a manner that all guides know, make a
couch that is wide and yielding and full of rest.

Up Little River, whose stones like the proverbial worm, turned when we
stepped on them and gave Eddie a hard fall; across Frozen Ocean--a place
which justified its name, for it was bitterly cold there and we did
nothing but keep the fire going and play pedro (to which end I put on
most of my clothes and got into my sleeping-bag)--through another stream
and a string of ponds, loitering and exploring until the final day.

It was on one reach of a smaller stream that we