boldly in the
offing, whilst our canoemen, now nearing their own home, broke
into an Indian chant, and were in high spirits. They expected
a big feast that night, and so did we! I had been a bit under
the weather, with flagging appetite, but felt again the grip
of healthy hunger.

We were now in close contact with the most innocently wild,
secluded, and apparently happy state of things imaginable--a real
Utopia, such as Sir Thomas More dreamt not of, being actually here,
with no trace of abortive politics or irritating ordinance. Here
was contentment in the savage wilderness--communion with Nature in
all her unstained purity and beauty. One thought of the many men of
mind who had moralized on this primitive life, and, tired of towns,
of "the weariness, the fever and the fret" of civilization, had
abandoned all and found rest and peace in the bosom of Mother
Nature.

The lake now narrowed into a deep but crooked stream, fringed,
as usual, by tall reeds and rushes and clumps of flowering
water-lilies. A four-mile paddle brought us to a long stretch
of deep lake, the second Wahpooskow, lined on the north by a
lovely shore, dotted with cabins, the central tall buildings
upon the summit of the rising ground being those of the English
"Church Mission Society," in charge of the Reverend Charles R.
Weaver. Here we were at last at the inland end of our journey,
at Wahpooskow--this, not the "Wabiscow" of the maps, being the
right spelling and pronunciation of the word, which means in
English "The Grassy Narrows."

The other Missions of this venerable Society in Athabasca,
it may be mentioned, were at the time as follows: Athabasca
Landing, the residence of Bishop Young; Lesser Slave Lake, White
Fish Lake, Smoky River, Spirit River, Fort Vermilion, and Fort
Chipewyan, in charge, respectively, of the Reverend Messrs.
Holmes, White, Currie, Robinson, Scott, and Warwick. The Roman
Catholic Mission, already mentioned, had been established three
years before our coming by the Reverend J. B. Giroux, at Stony
Point, near the outlet of the first lake, the other Oblat
Missions in Athabasca--I do not vouch for my accuracy--being
Athabasca Landing, Lesser Slave Lake, the residence of Bishop
Clut and clergy and of the Sisters of Providence; White Fish
Lake, Smoky River, Dunvegan, and St. John, served, respectively,
by Fathers Leferriere, Lesserec, and Letreste; Fort Vermilion
by Father Joussard, and Fort Chipewyan by Bishop Grouard and