[Illustration: "ELIZABETH ... COULD YET FIND TIME TO WALK AND CLIMB,
PLUNGING SPIRIT AND SENSE IN THE BEAUTY OF THE ROCKIES"]

LADY MERTON
COLONIST

BY

MRS. HUMPHRY WARD

FRONTISPIECE
BY ALBERT STERNER

1910




A FOREWORD

Towards the end of this story the readers of it will find an account of
an "unknown lake" in the northern Rockies, together with a picture of
its broad expanse, its glorious mountains, and of a white explorers'
tent pitched beside it. Strictly speaking, "Lake Elizabeth" is a lake of
dream. But it has an original on this real earth, which bears another
and a real name, and was discovered two years ago by my friend Mrs.
Schäffer, of Philadelphia, to whose enchanting narratives of travel and
exploration in these untrodden regions I listened with delight at Field,
British Columbia, in June, 1908. She has given me leave to use her own
photograph of the "unknown lake," and some details from her record of