consists in the fact, that it is the best place to play the vagabond,
and in which to do the savage for a season, that I know of. You can go
bareheaded or barefooted, without a coat or neckerchief, get as ragged
and untidy as you please, without subjecting yourself to remark, or
offending the nice sense of propriety pertaining to conventional life.
You are not responsible for what you say or do, provided always that
you do not offend against the abstract rules of decency, or the
requirements of natural decorum. You can lay around loose; the lazier
you are the better the boatman in your employ likes it. If you choose
to drift leisurely and quietly under the shadow of the hills along the
shore, examining the rocks that lie there like a ruined wall, or
explore the beautiful and secluded bays that hide around behind the
bluffs, or lay off under the shade of the fir trees on the islands, or
smoke your cigar or pipe by the beautiful spring that comes bubbling
up by the side of some moss-covered boulder, or from beneath the
tangled roots of some gnarled birch or maple, you can do any or all of
these, and have a man to help you for twelve shillings a day and
board, or you can do it just about as well alone.

"You remember LONESOME ROCK, in the Lower Saranac, a great boulder
that lifts its head some ten or fifteen feet above the surface, away
out near the middle of the lake, around which the water is of unknown
depth. This rock, which is always dark and bare, is, as you will
remember, of conical shape, sharp pointed at the top, and stands up
about the size of a small hay-stack, in the midst of the waters. Do
you remember the account that somebody gives in a ragged but terse
kind of verse, of the 'gentleman in black,' who, as he walked about,

'Backward and forward he switched his long rail,
As a gentleman switches his cane?'