forms of men gliding round their fires, as they danced
to the monotonous sound of the war dance; but these
migratory people, seldom continuing long in the same
spot, the island was again and again left to its solitude.

Strongly contrasted with this, would the spectator, whom
we still suppose standing on the bank where we first
placed him, find the view on his left. There would he
behold a neat small town, composed entirely of wooden
houses variously and not inelegantly painted; and receding
gradually from the river's edge to the slowly disappearing
forest, on which its latest rude edifice reposed. Between
the town and the fort, was to be seen a dockyard of no
despicable dimensions, in which the hum of human voices
mingled with the sound of active labour--there too might
be seen, in the deep harbour of the narrow channel that
separated the town from the island we have just described,
some half-dozen gallant vessels bearing the colours of
England, breasting with their dark prows the rapid current
that strained their creaking cables in every strand, and
seemingly impatient of the curb that checked them from
gliding impetuously into the broad lake, which some few
hundred yards below, appeared to court them to her bosom.
But although in these might be heard the bustle of warlike
preparation, the chief attention would be observed to be
directed towards a large half finished vessel, on which
numerous workmen of all descriptions were busily employed,
evidently with a view of preparing for immediate service.

Beyond the town again might be obtained a view of the