well use it. No fur is, of course, in season at this time of year,
and so there was no excuse for killing muskrats for the pelts.

In the vicinity of this camp we saw some of the largest spruce timber
that we came upon in the whole journey across Labrador. Some of these
trees were fully twenty-two inches in diameter at the butt and perhaps
fifty to sixty feet in height. These large trees were very scattered,
however, and too few to be of commercial value. For the most part the
trees that we met with were six to eight, and, occasionally, ten
inches through, scrubby and knotted. In Labrador trees worth the
cutting are always located near streams in sheltered valleys.

That evening before we retired the drizzle turned to a downpour, and
we were glad to leave our unprotected camp fire for the unwarmed
shelter of our tent. While I lay within and listened to the storm, I
wrote in my diary: "As I lie here, the rain pours upon the tent over
my head and drips--drips--drips through small holes in the silk; the
wind sweeps through the spruce trees outside and a breath of the
fragrance of the great damp forest comes to me. I hear the roar of
the rapid across the river as the waters pour down over the rocks in
their course to the sea. I wonder if some of those very waters do not
wash the shores of New York. How far away the city seems, and how
glad I shall be to return home when my work here is finished!

"This is a feeling that comes to one often in the wilderness. Perhaps
it is a touch of homesickness--a hunger for the sympathy and
companionship of our friends."

The days that followed were days of weary waiting and inactivity. A
cold northeast storm was blowing and the rain fell heavily and