portage was made so swiftly there was no time for that solace of the
common voyageur--the boatman's pipe. For eight days we travelled
without seeing a sign of human presence but that one vague footmark in
the sand.

"If there are no Indians, how much farther do we go, sir?" asked
Godefroy sulkily on the eighth day.

"Till we find them," answered M. Radisson.

And we found them that night.

A deer broke from the woods edging the sand where we camped and had
almost bounded across our fire when an Indian darted out a hundred
yards behind. Mistaking us for his own people, he whistled the
hunter's signal to head the game back. Then he saw that we were
strangers. Pulling up of a sudden, he threw back his arms, uttered a
cry of surprise, and ran to the hiding of the bush.

M. Radisson was the first to pursue; but where the sand joined the
thicket he paused and began tracing the point of his rapier round the
outlines of a mark.

"What do you make of it, Godefroy?" he demanded of the trader.

The trader looked quizzically at Sieur de Radisson.

"The toes of that man's moccasin turn out," says Godefroy significantly.

"Then that man is no Indian," retorted M. Radisson, "and hang me, if