"That's just what's troubling me; there are far too many limits. If this
is what you call pedestrianizing, I say, give me a good sidewalk or the
loan of an uneven pair of legs. It's dislocation of the hip or
inflammatory rheumatism of the knee-joint I'll be getting with this hop
and carry one navigation." Wilkinson plodded on in dignified silence,
till the sawmills of the deserted village came in sight, and, beyond it,
the blue green waters of Lake Simcoe. "Now," he said, "we shall take to
the water." "What?" enquired Coristine, "on our knapsacks?" to which his
companion answered, "No, on the excellent steamer _Emily May_."

There was no excellent steamer _Emily May_; there had not been for a
long time; it was a memory of the past. The railway had ruined
navigation. What was to be done? It would never do to retrace their
steps over the railroad ties, and the roads about Belle Ewart led
nowhere, while to track it along the hot lake shore was not to be
thought of. Wilkinson's plans had broken down; so Coristine left him at
the village hostelry, and sallied forth on exploration bent. In the
course of his wanderings he came to a lumber wharf, alongside which lay
an ancient schooner.

"Schooner ahoy!" he shouted, when a shock-headed man of uncertain middle
age poked his head up through a hatchway, and answered: "Ahoy yourself,
and see how you like it." This was discouraging, but not to a limb of
the law. Coristine half removed his wide awake, and said: "I have the
pleasure of addressing the captain of the ship _Susan Thomas_," the name
he had seen painted in gold letters on the stern.

"Not adzackly," replied the shock headed mariner, much mollified; "he's
my mate, and he'll be along as soon as he's made up his bundle. I'm