On Tuesday morning when we awoke the rain was still falling steadily.
During the forenoon the storm abated somewhat and we broke camp and
transferred our goods to the mainland, where the trail left the lake
near a good-sized brook. Our portage led us over small bills and
through marshes a mile and a half to another lake. While Pete
remained at our new camp to prepare supper and Easton stayed with him,
the rest of us brought forward the last load. Richards and I with a
canoe and packs attempted to run down the brook, which emptied into
the lake near our camp; but we soon found the stream too rocky, and
were forced to cut our way through a dense growth of willows and carry
the canoe and packs to camp on our backs.

The rain had ceased early in the afternoon, and the evening was
delightfully cool, so that the warmth of a big camp fire was most
grateful and comforting. Our day's march had carried us into a well-
wooded country, and the spectral dry sticks of the old burnt forest
were behind us. The clouds hung low and threatening, and in the
twilight beyond the glow of our leaping fire made the still waters of
the lake, with its encircling wilderness of fir trees, seem very dark
and somber. The genial warmth of the fire was so in contrast to the
chilly darkness of the tent that we sat long around it and talked of
our travels and prospects and the lake and the wilderness before us
that no white man had ever before seen, while the brook near by
tumbling over its rocky bed roared a constant complaint at our
intrusion into this land of solitude.

The following morning was cool and fine, but showers developed during
the day. Our venison, improderly dried, was molding, and much of it
we found, upon unpacking, to be maggoty. After breakfast I instructed