"That is easily said, but not so easily done," returned the guide.
"We shall be more exposed in the river than by following the woods;
and then there is the Oswego rift below us, and I am far from
sartain that Jasper himself can carry a boat safely through it in
the dark. What say you, lad, as to your own skill and judgment?"

"I am of Master Cap's opinion about using the canoe. Mabel is too
tender to walk through swamps and among roots of trees in such a
night as this promises to be, and then I always feel myself stouter
of heart and truer of eye when afloat than when ashore."

"Stout of heart you always be, lad, and I think tolerably true of
eye for one who has lived so much in broad sunshine and so little
in the woods. Ah's me! The Ontario has no trees, or it would be
a plain to delight a hunter's heart! As to your opinion, friends,
there is much for and much against it. For it, it may be
said water leaves no trail -- "

"What do you call the wake?" interrupted the pertinacious and
dogmatical Cap.

"Anan?"

"Go on," said Jasper; "Master Cap thinks he is on the ocean
-- water leaves no trail -- "

"It leaves none, Eau-douce, hereaway, though I do not pretend to
say what it may leave on the sea. Then a canoe is both swift and
easy when it floats with the current, and the tender limbs of the
Sergeant's daughter will be favored by its motion. But, on the