fishing and shooting. The fall and winter duck were beginning to come
in from the north, a sure sign that hard weather was close at hand.

We had had an early spring and a long warm summer. Generally speaking,
the ground does not close till about the middle of November; but this
year the frost set in much earlier. It did not, however, continue, for
the ground again opened, and we had nearly two weeks of beautiful
Indian summer in the early part of November.

On the 17th the ice was sufficiently strong to skate upon. On the 27th
day of October the first hard weather commenced, and as there was some
fear of the lake freezing, we determined to start for Cobourg the
following morning. I accordingly made the necessary preparations, and
hired an old man-of-war's-man, one Robert Redpath, to row us up the
lake to Tidy's.

It froze hard during the night. The ice was fully half an inch thick on
the bays, and along the margin of the lake we were obliged to break a
passage for the skiff for upwards of fifty yards before we got into
clear water. It was cold, and blew fresh from the north-west, and the
wind being directly down the lake, caused a heavy swell, which
increased every minute. As the gale freshened, our skiff shipped so
much water that we thought it prudent to put across to the Alnwick
shore, which was more under the lee, being sheltered by islands. While
passing near one of these, I observed some person walking to and fro,
apparently making signals of distress. I called Redpath's attention to
this, and bade him "row to the shore that we might ascertain what he
wanted." This our boatman positively refused to do, saying that "he had
hired himself to ferry us to Tidy's, and he was not bound to go half a
mile out of his way to hunt after every infernal Ingine (Indian) we