It was on a cold, bleak morning, about the beginning of March 1846, that I awoke from a comfortable snooze in my bedroom at Tadousac, and recollected that in a few hours I must take leave of my present quarters, and travel, on snow-shoes, sixty miles down the Gulf of St. Lawrence to the post of Isle Jérémie.
The wind howled mournfully through the leafless trees, and a few flakes of snow fell upon the window as I looked out upon the cheerless prospect. Winter—cold, biting, frosty winter—still reigned around. The shores of Tadousac Bay were still covered with the same coat of ice that had bound them up four months before; and the broad St. Lawrence still flowed on, black as ink, and laden with immense fields and hummocks of dirty ice, brought down from the banks of the river above. The land presented one uniform chilling prospect of bare trees and deep snow, over which I was soon to traverse many a weary mile.
There is nothing, however, like taking things philosophically; so, after venting my spite at the weather in one or two short grumbles, I sat down in a passable state of equanimity to breakfast. During the meal I discussed with Mr Stone the prospects of the impending journey, and indulged in a few excursive remarks upon snow-shoe travelling, whilst he related a few incidents of his own eventful career in the country.
On one occasion he was sent off upon a long journey over the snow, where the country was so mountainous that snowshoe walking was rendered exceedingly painful, by the feet slipping forward against the front bar of the shoe when descending the hills. After he had accomplished a good part of his journey, two large blisters rose under the nails of his great toes; and soon the nails themselves came off. Still he must go on, or die in the woods; so he was obliged to tie the nails on his toes each morning before starting, for the purpose of protecting the tender parts beneath; and every evening he wrapped them up carefully in a piece of rag, and put them into his waistcoat pocket—being afraid of losing them if he kept them on all night.
After breakfast I took leave of my friends at Tadousac, and, with a pair of snow-shoes under my arm, followed my companion Jordan to the boat which was to convey me the first twenty miles of the journey, and then land me, with one man, who was to be my only companion. In the boat was seated a Roman Catholic priest, on his way to visit a party of Indians a short distance down the gulf. The shivering men shipped their oars in silence, and we glided through the black water, while the ice grated harshly against the boat’s sides as we rounded Point Rouge. Another pull, and Tadousac was hidden from our view.
Few things can be more comfortless or depressing than a sail down the Gulf of St. Lawrence on a gloomy winter’s day, with the thermometer at zero! The water looks so black and cold, and the sky so gray, that it makes one shudder, and turn to look upon the land. But there no cheering prospect meets the view. Rocks—cold, hard, misanthropic rocks—grin from beneath volumes of snow; and the few stunted black-looking pines that dot the banks here and there only tend to render the scene more desolate. No birds fly about to enliven the traveller; and the only sound that meets the ear, besides the low sighing of the cold, cold wind, is the crashing of immense fields of ice, as they meet and war in the eddies of opposing currents. Fortunately, however, there was no ice near the shore, and we met with little interruption on the way. The priest bore the cold like a stoic; and my friend Jordan, being made, metaphorically speaking, of iron, treated it with the contemptuous indifference that might be expected from such metal.
In the evening we arrived at Esquimain River, where we took up our quarters in a small log-hut belonging to a poor seal-fisher, whose family, and a few men who attended a sawmill a short distance off, were the only inhabitants of this little hamlet. Here we remained all night, and prepared our snow-shoes for the morrow, as the boat was there to leave us and return to Tadousac. The night was calm and frosty, and everything gave promise of fine weather for our journey. But who can tell what an hour will bring forth? Before morning the weather became milder, and soon it began to thaw. A fine warm day, with a bright sun, be it known, is one of the most dreadful calamities that can befall a snowshoe traveller, as the snow then becomes soft and sticky, thereby drenching the feet and snow-shoes, which become painfully heavy from the quantity of snow which sticks to and falls upon them. In cold frosty weather the snow is dry, crisp, and fine, so that it falls through the network of the snow-shoe without leaving a feather’s weight behind, while the feet are dry and warm; but a thaw!—oh! it is useless attempting to recapitulate the miseries attending a thaw; my next day’s experience will show what it is.
Early on the following morning I jumped from my bed on the floor of the hut, and proceeded to equip myself for the march. The apartment in which I had passed the night presented a curious appearance. It measured about sixteen feet by twelve, and the greater part of this space was occupied by two beds, on which lay, in every imaginable position, the different members of the half-breed family to whom the mansion belonged. In the centre of the room stood a coarsely-constructed deal table, on which lay in confusion the remains of the preceding night’s supper. On the right of this, a large gaudily-painted Yankee clock graced the wall, and stared down upon the sleeping figures of the men. This, with a few rough wooden chairs and a small cupboard, comprised all the furniture of the house.
I soon singled out my man from among the sleeping figures on the floor, and bade him equip himself for the road—or rather for the march, for road we had none. In half an hour we were ready; and having fortified ourselves with a cup of weak tea and a slice of bread, left the house and commenced our journey.
My man Bezeau (a French Canadian) was dressed in a blue striped cotton shirt, of very coarse quality, and a pair of corduroys, strapped round his waist with a scarlet belt. Over these he wore a pair of blue cloth leggins, neatly bound with orange-coloured ribbon. A Glengarry bonnet covered his head; and two pairs of flannel socks, under a pair of raw seal-skin shoes, protected his feet from the cold. His burden consisted of my carpet-bag, two days’ provisions, and a blue cloth capote—which latter he carried over his shoulder, the weather being warm. My dress consisted of a scarlet flannel shirt, and a pair of étoffe du pays trousers, which were fastened round my waist by a leathern belt, from which depended a small hunting-knife; a foraging cap and deer-skin moccasins completed my costume. My burden was a large green blanket, a greatcoat, and a tin tea-kettle. Our only arms of offence or defence were the little hunting-knife before mentioned, and a small axe for felling trees, should we wish to make a fire. We brought no guns, as there was little prospect of meeting any game on the road; and it behoves one, when travelling on foot, to carry as little as possible.
Thus we started from Esquimain River. The best joke, however, of all was, that neither I nor my man had ever travelled that way before! All we knew was, that we had to walk fifty miles through an uninhabited country, and that then we should, or at least ought to, reach Isle Jérémie. There were two solitary houses, however, that we had to pass on the way; the one an outpost of the Hudson Bay Company, the other a saw-mill belonging to one of the lumber companies (or timber-traders) in Quebec. In fact, the best idea of our situation may be had from the following lines, which may be supposed to have been uttered by the establishment to which we were bound:—
“Through the woods, through the woods, follow and find me,
Search every hollow, and dingle, and dell;
To the right, left, or front, you may pass, or behind me,
Unless you are careful, and look for me well.”
The first part of our road lay along the shores of the St. Lawrence.
The sun shone brightly, and the drifting ice in the gulf glittered in its rays as it flowed slowly out to sea; but ere long the warm rays acted upon the snow, and rendered walking toilsome and fatiguing. After about an hour’s walk along the shore, we arrived at the last hut we were likely to see that day. It was inhabited by an Indian and his family. Here we rested a few minutes, and I renewed my snow-shoe lines, the old ones having broken by the way.
Shortly after this we passed the wreck of what had once been a fine ship. She lay crushed and dismasted among the rocks and lumps of ice which lined the desolate shore, her decks and the stumps of her masts drifted over with snow. Six short months before, she had bounded over the Atlantic wave in all the panoply of sail and rigging pertaining to a large three-master, inclosing in her sturdy hull full many a daring heart beating high with sanguine hopes, and dreaming of fame and glory, or perchance of home. But now, how great the change!—her sails and masts uprooted, and her helm—the seaman’s confidence and safeguard—gone; her bed upon the rocks and pebbles of a dreary shore; and her shattered hull hung round with icicles, and wrapped in the cold embraces of the wintry ocean. Few things, I think, can have a more inexpressibly melancholy appearance than a wreck upon a rocky and deserted shore in winter.
The road now began to get extremely bad. The ice, over which we had to walk for miles, had been covered with about six inches of water and snow. A sharp frost during the night had covered this with a cake of ice sufficiently strong to bear us up until we got fairly upon it, and were preparing to take another step, when down it went—so that we had a sort of natural treadmill to exercise ourselves upon all day; while every time we sank, as a matter of course our snowshoes were covered with a mixture of water, snow, and broken ice, to extricate our feet from which almost pulled our legs out of the sockets.
In this way we plodded slowly and painfully along, till we came to a part of the shore where the ice had been entirely carried off, leaving the sandy beach uncovered for about two miles. We gladly took advantage of this, and, pulling off our snow-shoes, walked along among the shells and tangle of the sea-shore. At this agreeable part of our journey, while we walked lightly along, with our snow-shoes under our arms, I fell into a reverie upon the superior advantages of travelling in cold weather, and the delights of walking on sandy beaches in contrast with wet snow. These cogitations, however, were suddenly interrupted by our arrival at the place where the ice had parted from the general mass; so, with a deep sigh, we resumed our snow-shoes. My feet, from the friction of the lines, now began to feel very painful; so, having walked about ten miles, I proposed taking a rest. To this my man, who seemed rather tired, gladly acceded, and we proceeded to light a fire under the stem of a fallen tree which opportunely presented itself.
Here we sat down comfortably together; and while our wet shoes and socks dried before the blazing fire, and our chafed toes wriggled joyously at being relieved from the painful harness of the snow-shoes, we swallowed a cup of congou with a degree of luxurious enjoyment, appreciable only by those who have walked themselves into a state of great exhaustion after a hurried breakfast.
Greatly refreshed by the tea, we resumed our journey in better spirits, and even affected to believe we were taking an agreeable afternoon walk for the first mile or so. We soon, however, fell to zero again, as we gazed wistfully upon the long line of coast stretching away to the horizon. But there was no help for it; on we splashed, sometimes through ice, water, and snow, and sometimes across the shingly beach, till the day was far spent, when I became so exhausted that I could scarcely drag one foot after the other, and moved along almost mechanically. My man, too, strong as he was, exhibited symptoms of fatigue; though, to do him justice, he was at least seven times more heavily laden than I.
While we jogged slowly along in this unenviable condition, a lump of ice offered so tempting a seat that we simultaneously proposed to sit down. This was very foolish. Resting without a fire is bad at all times; and the exhausted condition we were then in made it far worse, as I soon found to my cost. Tired as I was before, I could have walked a good deal farther; but no sooner did I rise again to my feet than an inexpressible weakness overcame me, and I felt that I could go no farther. This my man soon perceived, and proposed making a fire and having a cup of tea; and then, if I felt better, we might proceed. This I agreed to; so, entering the woods, we dug a hole in the snow, and in half an hour had a fire blazing in it that would have roasted an ox! In a short time a panful of snow was converted into hot tea; and as I sat sipping this, and watching the white smoke as it wreathed upwards from the pipe of my good-natured guide, I never felt rest more delightful.
The tea refreshed us so much that we resumed our journey, intending, if possible, to reach Port Neuf during the night; and as we calculated that we had walked between fifteen and eighteen miles, we hoped to reach it in a few hours.
Away, then, we went, and plodded on till dark without reaching the post; nevertheless, being determined to travel as long as we could, we pushed on till near midnight, when, being quite done up, and seeing no sign of the establishment, we called a council of war, and sat down on a lump of ice to discuss our difficulties. I suggested that if we had not already passed the post, in all probability we should do so, if we continued to travel any farther in the dark. My companion admitted that he entertained precisely the same views on the subject; and, furthermore, that as we both seemed pretty tired, and there happened to be a nice little clump of willows, intermixed with pine trees, close at hand, his opinion was that nothing better could be done than encamping for the night. I agreed to this; and the resolution being carried unanimously, the council adjourned, and we proceeded to make our encampment.
First of all, the snow was dug away from the foot of a large pine with our snow-shoes, which we used as spades; and when a space of about ten feet long, by six broad, was cleared, we covered it with pine branches at one end, and made a roaring fire against the tree at the other. The snow rose all around to the height of about four feet, so that when our fire blazed cheerily, and our supper was spread out before it upon my green blanket, we looked very comfortable indeed—and what was of much more consequence, felt so. Supper consisted of a cup of tea, a loaf of bread, and a lump of salt butter. After having partaken largely of these delicacies, we threw a fresh log upon the fire, and rolling ourselves in our blankets, were soon buried in repose.
Next morning, on awaking, the first thing I became aware of was the fact that it was raining, and heavily too, in the shape of a Scotch mist. I could scarcely believe it, and rubbed my eyes to make sure; but there was no mistake about it at all. The sky was gray, cold, and dismal, and the blanket quite wet! “Well,” thought I, as I fell back in a sort of mute despair, “this is certainly precious weather for snow-shoe travelling!” I nudged my sleeping companion, and the look of melancholy resignation which he put on, as he became gradually aware of the state of matters, convinced me that bad as yesterday had been, to-day would be far worse.
When I got upon my legs, I found that every joint in my body was stiffer than the rustiest hinge ever heard of in the annals of doors! and my feet as tender as a chicken’s, with huge blisters all over them. Bezeau, however, though a little stiff, was otherwise quite well, being well inured to hardships of every description.
It is needless to recount the miseries of the five miles’ walk that we had to make before arriving at Port Neuf, over ground that was literally next to impassable. About nine o’clock we reached the house, and remained there for the rest of the day. Here, for three days, we were hospitably entertained by the Canadian family inhabiting the place; during this time it rained and thawed so heavily that we could not venture to resume our journey.
On the 16th the weather became colder, and Bezeau announced his opinion that we might venture to proceed. Glad to be once more on the move—for fears of being arrested altogether by the setting-in of spring had begun to beset me—I once more put on my snow-shoes; and, bidding adieu to the hospitable inmates of Port Neuf, we again wended our weary way along the coast. Alas! our misfortunes had not yet ceased. The snow was much softer than we anticipated, and the blisters on my feet, which had nearly healed during the time we stayed at Port Neuf, were now torn open afresh. After a painful and laborious walk of eight or nine miles, we arrived at a small house, where a few enterprising men lived who had penetrated thus far down the gulf to erect a saw-mill.
Here we found, to our infinite joy, a small flat-bottomed boat, capable of carrying two or three men; so, without delay, we launched it, and putting our snow-shoes and provisions into it, my man and I jumped in, and pulled away down the gulf, intending to finish the twenty miles that still remained of our journey by water. We were obliged to pull a long way out to sea, to avoid the ice which lined the shore, and our course lay a good deal among drifting masses.
Half an hour after we embarked a snow-storm came on, but still we pulled along, preferring anything to resuming the snow-shoes.
After a few hours’ rowing, we rested on our oars, and refreshed ourselves with a slice of bread and a glass of rum—which latter, having forgotten to bring water with us, we were obliged to drink pure. We certainly cut a strange figure, while thus lunching in our little boat—surrounded by ice, and looking hazy through the thickly falling snow, which prevented us from seeing very far ahead, and made the mountains on shore look quite spectral.
For about five miles we pulled along in a straight line, after which the ice trended outwards, and finally brought us to a stand-still by running straight out to sea. This was an interruption we were not at all prepared for, and we felt rather undecided how to proceed. After a little confabulation, we determined to pull out, and see if the ice did not again turn in the proper direction; but after pulling straight out for a quarter of a mile, we perceived, or imagined we perceived, to our horror, that the ice, instead of being stationary, as we supposed it to be, was floating slowly out to sea with the wind, and carrying us along with it. No time was to be lost; so, wheeling about, we rowed with all our strength for the shore, and after a pretty stiff pull gained the solid ice. Here we hauled the flat up out of the water with great difficulty, and once more put on our snow-shoes.
Our road still lay along shore, and, as the weather was getting colder, we proceeded along much more easily than heretofore. In an hour or two the snow ceased to fall, and showed us that the ice was not drifting, but that it ran so far out to sea that it would have proved a bar to our further progress by water at any rate.
The last ten miles of our journey now lay before us; and we sat down, before starting, to have another bite of bread and a pull at the rum bottle; after which, we trudged along in silence. The peculiar compression of my guide’s lips, and the length of step that he now adopted, showed me that he had made up his mind to get through the last part of the journey without stopping; so, tightening my belt, and bending my head forward, I plodded on, solacing myself as we advanced by humming, “Follow, follow, over mountain,—follow, follow, over sea!” etcetera.
About four or five o’clock in the afternoon, upon rounding a point, we were a little excited by perceiving evident signs of the axe having been at work in the forest; and a little farther on discovered, to our inexpressible joy, a small piece of ground enclosed as a garden. This led us to suppose that the post could not be far off, so we pushed forward rapidly; and upon gaining the summit of a small eminence, beheld with delight the post of Isle Jérémie.
This establishment, like most of the others on the St. Lawrence, is merely a collection of scattered buildings, most of which are storehouses and stables. It stands in a hollow of the mountains, and close to a large bay, where sundry small boats and a sloop lay quietly at anchor. Upon a little hillock close to the principal house is a Roman Catholic chapel; and behind it stretches away the broad St. Lawrence, the south shore of which is indistinctly seen on the horizon. We had not much inclination, however, to admire the scenery just then; so, hastening down the hill, my man walked into the men’s house, where in five minutes he was busily engaged eating bread and pork, and recounting his adventures to a circle of admiring friends; while I warmed myself beside a comfortable fire in the hall, and chatted with the gentleman in charge of the establishment.
At Isle Jérémie I remained about six weeks; or rather, I should say, belonged to the establishment for that time, as during a great part of it I was absent from the post. Mr Coral, soon after my arrival, went to visit the Company’s posts lower down the St. Lawrence, leaving me in charge of Isle Jérémie; and as I had little or nothing to do in the way of business (our Indians not having arrived from the interior), most of my time was spent in reading and shooting.
It was here I took my first lessons in navigation—I mean in a practical way; as for the scientific part of the business, that was deferred to a more favourable opportunity—and, truly, the lessons were rather rough. The way of it was this:— Our flour at Isle Jérémie had run out. Indians were arriving every day calling loudly for flour, and more were expected; so Mr Coral told me, one fine morning, to get ready to go to Tadousac in the boat for a load of flour. This I prepared to do at once, and started after breakfast in a large boat, manned by two men. The wind was fair, and I fired a couple of shots with my fowling-piece, as we cleared the harbour, in answer to an equal number of salutes from two iron cannons that stood in front of the house. By-the-bye, one of these guns had a melancholy interest attached to it a few months after this. While firing a salute of fourteen rounds, in honour of the arrival of a Roman Catholic bishop, one of them exploded while the man who acted as gunner was employed in ramming home the cartridge, and blew him about twenty yards down the bank. The unfortunate man expired in a few hours. Poor fellow! he was a fine little Canadian, and had sailed with me, not many weeks before, in a voyage up the St. Lawrence. But to return. Our voyage, during the first few days, was prosperous enough, and I amused myself in shooting the gulls which were foolish enough to come within range of my gun, and in recognizing the various places along shore where I had rested and slept on the memorable occasion of my snow-shoe trip.
But when did the St. Lawrence prove friendly for an entire voyage? Certainly not when I had the pleasure of ploughing its rascally waters! The remainder of our voyage was a succession of squalls, calms, contrary winds, sticking on shoals for hours, and being detained on shore, with an accompaniment of pitching, tossing, oscillation and botheration, that baffles all description. However, time brings the greatest miseries to an end; and in the process of time we arrived at Tadousac—loaded our boat deeply with flour—shook hands with our friends—related our adventures—bade them adieu—and again found ourselves scudding down the St. Lawrence, with a snoring breeze on our quarter.
Now this was truly a most delectable state of things, when contrasted with our wretched trip up; so we wrapped our blankets round us (for it was very cold), and felicitated ourselves considerably on such good fortune. It was rather premature, however; as, not long after, we had a very narrow escape from being swamped. The wind, as I said before, was pretty strong, and it continued so the whole way; so that on the evening of the second day we came within sight of Isle Jérémie, while running before a stiff breeze, through the green waves which were covered with foam. Our boat had a “drooping nose,” and was extremely partial to what the men termed “drinking;” in other words, it shipped a good deal of water over the bows. Now it happened that while we were straining our eyes ahead, to catch a sight of our haven, an insidious squall was creeping fast down behind us. The first intimation we had of its presence was a loud and ominous hiss, which made us turn our heads round rather smartly; but it was too late—for with a howl, that appeared to be quite vicious the wind burst upon our sails, and buried the boat in the water, which rushed in a cataract over the bows, and nearly filled us in a moment, although the steersman threw her into the wind immediately. The sheets were instantly let go, and one of the men, who happened to be a sailor, jumped up, and, seizing an axe, began to cut down the main-mast, at the same time exclaiming to the steersman, “You’ve done for us now, Cooper!” He was mistaken, however, for the sails were taken in just in time to save us; and, while the boat lay tumbling in the sea, we all began to bail, with anything we could lay hands on, as fast as we could. In a few minutes the boat was lightened enough to allow of our hoisting the fore-sail; and about half an hour afterwards we were safely anchored in the harbour.
This happened within about three or four hundred yards of the shore; yet the best swimmer in the world would have been drowned ere he reached it, as the water was so bitterly cold, that when I was bailing for my life, and, consequently, in pretty violent exercise, my hands became quite benumbed and almost powerless.
Shortly after this I was again sent up to Tadousac, in charge of a small bateau, of about ten or fifteen tons, with a number of shipwrecked seamen on board. These unfortunate men had been cast on shore about the commencement of winter, on an uninhabited part of the coast, and had remained without provisions or fire for a long time, till they were discovered by a gentleman of the Hudson Bay Company, and conveyed over the snow in sleighs to the nearest establishment, which happened to be Isle Jérémie. Here they remained all winter, in a most dreadfully mutilated condition, some of them having been desperately frozen. One of the poor fellows, a negro, had one of his feet frozen off at the ankle, and had lost all the toes and the heel of the other, the bone being laid bare for about an inch and a half. Mr Coral, the gentleman who had saved them, did all in his power to relieve their distress—amputating their frozen limbs, and dressing their wounds, while they were provided with food and warm clothing. I am sorry to say, however, that these men, who would have perished had it not been for Mr Coral’s care of them, were the first, upon arriving at Quebec the following spring, to open their mouths in violent reproach and bitter invective against him; forgetting that, while their only charge against him was a little severity in refusing them a few trifling and unnecessary luxuries, he had saved them from a painful and lingering death.
In a couple of days we arrived at Tadousac the second time, to the no small astonishment of my brother scribbler residing there. After reloading our craft, we directed our course once more down the gulf.
This time the wind was also favourable, but, unfortunately, a little too strong; so we were obliged, in the evening, to come to an anchor in Esquimain River. This river has good anchorage close to the bank, but is very deep in the lead, or current; this, however, we did not know at the time, and seeing a small schooner close to shore, we rounded to a few fathoms outside of her, and let go our anchor. Whirr! went the chain—ten! twelve! sixteen! till at last forty fathoms ran out, and only a little bit remained on board, and still we had no bottom. After attaching our spare cable to the other one, the anchor at last grounded. This, however, was a dangerous situation to remain in, as, if the wind blew strong, we would have to run out to sea, and so much cable would take a long time to get in; so I ordered my two men, in a very pompous, despotic way, to heave up the anchor again. But not a bit would it budge. We all heaved at the windlass; still the obstinate anchor held fast. Again we gave another heave, and smashed both the handspikes.
In this dilemma I begged assistance from the neighbouring schooner, and they kindly sent all their men on board with new handspikes; but our refractory anchor would not let go, and at last it was conjectured that it had got foul of a rock, and that it was not in the power of mortal man to move it. Under these pleasant circumstances we went to bed, in hopes that the falling tide might swing us clear before morning. This turned out just as we expected—or, rather, a little better—for next morning, when I went on deck, I found that we were drifting quietly down the gulf, stern foremost, all the sails snugly tied up, and the long cable dragging at the bows! Towards evening we arrived at Jérémie, and I gladly resigned command of the vessel to my first lieutenant.
One afternoon, near the middle of April, I sat sunning myself in the veranda before the door of the principal house at Isle Jérémie, and watched the fields of ice, as they floated down the Gulf of St. Lawrence, occasionally disappearing behind the body of a large pig, which stood upon a hillock close in front of me, and then reappearing again as the current swept them slowly past the intervening obstacle.
Mr Coral, with whom I had been leading a very quiet, harmless sort of life for a couple of weeks past, leant against a wooden post, gazing wistfully out to sea. Suddenly he turned towards me, and with great gravity told me that, as there was nothing particular for me to do at the establishment, he meant to send me down to Seven Islands, to relieve the gentleman at that post of his charge; adding, that as he wished me to set off the following morning at an early hour, I had better pack up a few things to-night.
Now, this order may not seem, at the first glance, a very dreadful one; but taking into consideration that Seven Islands is one hundred and twenty miles below the post at which I then resided, it did appear as if one would wish to think about it a little before starting. Not having time to think about it, however, I merely, in a sort of bantering desperation, signified my readiness to undertake a voyage to any part of the undiscovered world, at any moment he (Mr Coral) might think proper, and then vanished, to prepare myself for the voyage.
It was optional with me whether I should walk through one hundred and twenty miles of primeval and most impassable forest, or paddle over an equal number of miles of water. Preferring the latter, as being at once the less disagreeable and more expeditious method, I accordingly, on the following morning, embarked in a small Indian canoe, similar to the one in which I had formerly travelled with two Indians in the North-West. My companions were—a Canadian, who acted as steersman; a genuine Patlander, who ostensibly acted as bowsman, but in reality was more useful in the way of ballast; and a young Newfoundland dog, which I had got as a present from Mr Stone while at Tadousac.
When we were all in our allotted places, the canoe was quite full; and we started from Isle Jérémie in good spirits, with the broad, sun-like face of Mike Lynch looming over the bows of the canoe, and the black muzzle of Humbug (the dog) resting on its gunwale.
It is needless to describe the voyage minutely. We had the usual amount of bad and good weather, and ran the risk several times of upsetting; we had, also, several breakfasts, dinners, suppers, and beds in the forest; and on the afternoon of the third day we arrived at Goodbout, an establishment nearly half-way between the post I had left and the one to which I was bound. Here we stayed all night, proposing to start again on the morrow. But the weather was so stormy as to prevent us for a couple of days trusting ourselves out in a frail bark canoe.
Early on the third morning, however, I took my place as steersman in the stern of our craft (my former guide being obliged to leave me here), and my man Mike squeezed his unwieldy person into the bow. In the middle lay our provisions and baggage, over which the black muzzle of Humbug peered anxiously out upon the ocean. In this trim we paddled from the beach, amid a shower of advice to keep close to shore, in case the big-fish—alias, the whales—might take a fancy to upset us.
After a long paddle of five or six hours we arrived at Pointe des Monts, where rough weather obliged us to put ashore. Here I remained all night, and slept in the lighthouse—a cylindrical building of moderate height, which stands on a rock off Pointe des Monte, and serves to warn sailors off the numerous shoals with which this part of the gulf is filled. In the morning we fortunately found an Indian with his boat, who was just starting for Seven Islands; and after a little higgling, at which Mike proved himself quite an adept, he agreed to give us a lift for a few pounds of tobacco. Away, then, we went, with:—
“A wet sheet and a flowing sea,
And a wind that followed fast,”
ploughing through the water in beautiful style.
The interior of our boat presented a truly ludicrous, and rather filthy scene. The Indian, who was a fine-looking man of about thirty, had brought his whole family—sons, daughters, brothers, sisters, wife, and mother—and a more heterogeneous mass of dirty, dark-skinned humanity I never before had the ill-luck to travel with. The mother of the flock was the most extraordinary being that I ever beheld. She must have been very near a hundred years old, as black and wrinkled as a singed hide, yet active and playful as a kitten. She was a very bad sailor, however, and dived down into the bottom of the boat the moment a puff of wind arose. Indians have a most extraordinary knack of diminishing their bulk, which is very convenient sometimes. Upon this occasion it was amusing to watch them settling gradually down, upon the slightest appearance of wind, until you might almost believe they had squeezed themselves quite through the bottom of the boat, and left only a few dirty blankets to tell the tale. Truly, one rarely meets with such a compact mass of human ballast. If, however, a slight lull occurred, or the sun peeped out from behind a cloud, there was immediately a perceptible increase in the bulk of the mass, and gradually a few heads appeared, then a leg, and soon a few arms; till at last the whole batch were up, laughing, talking, singing, eating, and chattering in a most uproarious state of confusion!
After the usual amount of storms, calms, and contrary winds, we arrived in safety at the post of Seven Islands, where I threw my worthy friend Mr Anderson into a state of considerable surprise and agitation by informing him that in the individual before him he beheld his august successor!
The establishment of Seven Islands is anything but an inviting place, although pretty enough on a fine day; and the general appearance of the surrounding scenery is lonely, wild, and desolate. The houses are built on a low sandy beach, at the bottom of the large bay of Seven Islands. The trees around are thinly scattered, and very small. In the background, rugged hills stretch as far as the eye can see; and in front, seven lofty islands, from which the bay and post derive their name, obstruct the view, affording only a partial glimpse of the open sea beyond. No human habitations exist within seventy miles of the place. Being out of the line of sailing, no vessels ever visit it, except when driven to the bay for shelter; and the bay is so large, that many vessels come in and go out again without having been observed. Altogether, I found it a lonely and desolate place, during a residence of nearly four months.
An extensive salmon-fishery is carried on at a large river called the Moisie, about eighteen miles below the post, where the Company sometimes catch and salt upwards of eighty and ninety tierces of fish.
During my sojourn there, I made one or two excursions to the fishery, a description of which may perhaps prove interesting to those versed in the more practical branches of ichthyology.
It was a lovely morning in June when Mr Anderson and I set out from Seven Islands on foot, with our coats (for the weather was warm) slung across our backs, and walked rapidly along the beach in the direction of the river Moisie. The weather was very calm, and the mosquitoes, consequently, rather annoying; but, as our progressive motion disconcerted their operations a little, we did not mind them much. The beach all the way was composed of fine hard sand, so that we found the walk very agreeable. A few loons dived about in the sea, and we passed two or three flocks of black ducks, known in some parts of the country by the name of “old wives;” but, having brought no gun with us, the old ladies were permitted to proceed on their way unmolested. The land all along presented the same uniform line of forest, with the yellow sand of the beach glittering at its edge; and as we cleared the islands, the boundless ocean opened upon our view.
In about four hours or so we arrived at the mouth of the Moisie, where the first fishery is established. Here we found that our men had caught and salted a good many salmon, some of which had just come from the nets, and lay on the grass, plump and glittering, in their pristine freshness. They looked very tempting, and we had one put in the kettle immediately; which, when we set to work at him soon afterwards, certainly did not belie his looks. The salmon had only commenced to ascend the river that day, and were being taken by fifties at a haul in the nets. The fishery was attended by three men, who kept seven or eight nets constantly in the water, which gave them enough of employment—two of them attending to the nets, while the third split, salted, and packed the fish in large vats. Here we spent the night, and slept in a small house about ten feet long by eight broad, built for the accommodation of the fishermen.
Next morning we embarked in a boat belonging to a trapper, and went up the river with a fair wind, to visit the fisheries higher up. On the way we passed a seal-net belonging to the owner of the boat, and at our request he visited it, and found seven or eight fine seals in it: they were all dead, and full of water. Seal-nets are made the same as salmon-nets, except that the mesh is larger, the seal having a pretty good-sized cranium of his own. After a good deal of unravelling and pulling, we got them all out of the net, and proceeded onward with our cargo.
The scenery on the river Moisie is pleasing: the banks are moderately high, and covered to the foot with the richest and most variegated verdure; while here and there, upon rounding some of the curvatures of the stream, long vistas of the river may be seen, embedded in luxuriant foliage. Thirteen or fourteen miles up the river is the Frog Creek fishery, at which we arrived late in the afternoon, and found that the man superintending it had taken a good many fish, and expected more. He visited his nets while we were there, but returned with only a few salmon. Some of them were badly cut up by the seals, which are the most formidable enemies of fishermen, as they eat and destroy many salmon, besides breaking the nets. We were detained here by rain all night, and slept in the small fishing-house.
Travelling makes people acquainted with strange beds as well as strange bed-fellows; but I question if many people can boast of having slept on a bed of nets. This we were obliged to do here, having brought no blankets with us, as we expected to have returned to the Point fishery in the evening. The bedstead was a long low platform, in one end of the little cabin, and was big enough to let four people sleep in it—two of us lying abreast at one end, and two more at the other end, feet to feet. A large salmon-net formed a pretty good mattress; another, spread out on top of us, served as a blanket; and a couple of trout-nets were excellent as pillows. From this piscatorial couch we arose early on the following morning, and breakfasted on a splendid fresh salmon; after which we resumed our journey. In a couple of hours we arrived at the Rapid fishery, where I found that my old friend Mike, the Irishman, had caught a great number of salmon. He was very bitter, however, in his remarks upon the seals, which it seems had made great havoc among his nets during the last two days. A black bear, too, was in the habit of visiting his station every morning, and, sitting on a rock not far off, watched his motions with great apparent interest while he took the fish out of the nets. Mike, poor man, regretted very much that he had no gun, as he might perhaps shoot “the baste.” Bears are very destructive at times to the salted salmon, paying visits during the night to the vats, and carrying off and tearing to pieces far more than they are capable of devouring.
While inspecting the nets here, we witnessed an interesting seal-hunt. Two Indians, in separate canoes, were floating quietly in a small eddy, with their guns cocked, ready to fire at the first unfortunate seal that should show his head on the surface of the stream. They had not waited long when one popped up his head, and instantly got a shot, which evidently hurt him, as he splashed a little, and then dived. In a minute the Indian reloaded his gun, and paddled out into the stream, in order to have another shot the moment the seal rose for air: this he did in a short time, when another shot was fired, which turned him over apparently lifeless. The Indian then laid down his gun, and seizing his paddle, made towards the spot where the seal lay. He had scarcely approached a few yards, however, when it recovered a little, and dived—much to the Indian’s chagrin, who had approached too near the head of a small rapid, and went down, stern foremost, just at the moment his friend the seal did the same. On arriving at the bottom, the animal, after one or two kicks, expired, and the Indian at last secured his prize. After this, we embarked again in our boat; and the wind for once determined to be accommodating, as it shifted in our favour, almost at the same time that we turned to retrace our way. In a few hours we arrived at the fishery near the mouth of the river, where we found supper just ready.
After supper, which we had about eight o’clock, the night looked so fine, and the mosquitoes in the little smoky house were so troublesome, that we determined to walk up to the post; so, ordering one of the men to follow us, away we went along the beach. The night was fine, though dark, and we trudged rapidly along. It was very tiresome work, however, as, the tide being full, we were obliged to walk upon the soft sand. Everything along the beach looked huge and mystical in the uncertain light; and this, accompanied with the solemn boom of the waves as they fell at long intervals upon the shore, made the scene quite romantic. After five hours’ sharp walking, with pocket-handkerchiefs tied round our heads to guard us from the attacks of mosquitoes, we arrived at Seven Islands between one and two in the morning.
Not long after this, a boat arrived with orders for my companion, Mr Anderson, to pack up his worldly goods and start for Tadousac. The same day he bade me adieu and set sail. In a few minutes the boat turned a point of land, and I lost sight of one of the most kindly and agreeable men whom I have had the good fortune to meet in the Nor’-West.
The situation in which I found myself was a novel, and, to say truth, not a very agreeable one. A short way off stood a man watching contemplatively the point round which the boat had just disappeared; and this man was my only companion in the world!—my Friday, in fact. Not another human being lived within sixty miles of our solitary habitation, with the exception of the few men at the distant fishery. In front of us, the mighty Gulf of St. Lawrence stretched out to the horizon, its swelling bosom unbroken, save by the dipping of a sea-gull or the fin of a whale. Behind lay the dense forest, stretching back, without a break in its primeval wildness, across the whole continent of America to the Pacific Ocean; while above and below lay the rugged mountains that form the shores of the gulf. As I walked up to the house, and wandered like a ghost through its empty rooms, I felt inexpressibly melancholy, and began to have unpleasant anticipations of spending the winter at this lonely spot.
Just as this thought occurred to me, my dog Humbug bounded into the room, and, looking with a comical expression up in my face for a moment, went bounding off again. This incident induced me to take a more philosophical view of affairs. I began to gaze round upon my domain, and whisper to myself that I was “monarch of all I surveyed.” All the mighty trees in the wood were mine—if I chose to cut them down; all the fish in the sea were mine—if I could only catch them; and the palace of Seven Islands was also mine. The regal feeling inspired by the consideration of these things induced me to call in a very kingly tone of voice for my man (he was a French Canadian), who politely answered, “Oui, monsieur.”
“Dinner!” said I, falling back in my throne, and contemplating through the palace window our vast dominions!
On the following day a small party of Indians arrived, and the bustle of trading their furs, and asking questions about their expectations of a good winter hunt, tended to disperse those unpleasant feelings of loneliness that at first assailed me.
One of these poor Indians had died while travelling, and his relatives brought the body to be interred in our little burying-ground. The poor creatures came in a very melancholy mood to ask me for a few planks to make a coffin for him. They soon constructed a rough wooden box, in which the corpse was placed, and then buried. No ceremony attended the interment of this poor savage; no prayer was uttered over the grave; and the only mark that the survivors left upon the place was a small wooden cross, which those Indians who have been visited by Roman Catholic priests are in the habit of erecting over their departed relatives.
The almost total absence of religion of any kind among these unhappy natives is truly melancholy. The very name of our blessed Saviour is almost unknown by the hundreds of Indians who inhabit the vast forests of North America. It is strange that, while so many missionaries have been sent to the southern parts of the earth, so few should have been sent to the northward. There are not, I believe, more than a dozen or so of Protestant clergymen over the whole wide northern continent.
For at least a century these North American Indians have hunted for the white men, and poured annually into Britain a copious stream of wealth. Surely it is the duty of Christian Britain, in return, to send out faithful servants of God to preach the gospel of our Lord throughout their land.
The Indians, after spending a couple of days at the establishment—during which time they sold me a great many furs—set out again to return to their distant wigwams. It is strange to contemplate the precision and certainty with which these men travel towards any part of the vast wilderness, even where their route lies across numerous intricate and serpentine rivers. But the strangest thing of all is, the savage’s certainty of finding his way in winter through the trackless forest, to a place where, perhaps, he never was before, and of which he has had only a slight description. They have no compasses, but the means by which they discover the cardinal points is curious. If an Indian happens to become confused with regard to this, he lays down his burden, and, taking his axe, cuts through the bark of a tree; from the thickness or thinness of which he can tell the north point at once, the bark being thicker on that side.
For a couple of weeks after this, I remained at the post with my solitary man, endeavouring by all the means in my power to dispel ennui; but it was a hard task. Sometimes I shouldered my gun and ranged about the forest in search of game, and occasionally took a swim in the sea. I was ignorant at the time, however, that there were sharks in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, else I should have been more cautious. The Indians afterwards told me that they were often seen, and several gentlemen who had lived long on the coast corroborated their testimony. Several times Indians have left the shores of the gulf in their canoes, to go hunting, and have never been heard of again, although the weather at the time was calm; so that it was generally believed that shark had upset the canoes and devoured the men. An occurrence that afterwards happened to an Indian renders this supposition highly probable. This man had been travelling along the shores of the gulf with his family—a wife and several children—in a small canoe. Towards evening, as he was crossing a large bay, a shark rose near his canoe, and, after reconnoitring a short time, swam towards it, and endeavoured to upset it. The size of the canoe, however, rendered this impossible; so the ferocious monster actually began to break it to pieces, by rushing forcibly against it. The Indian fired at the shark when he first saw it, but without effect; and, not having time to reload, he seized his paddle and made for the shore. The canoe, however, from the repeated attacks of the fish, soon became leaky, and it was evident that in a few minutes more the whole party would be at the mercy of the infuriated monster. In this extremity the Indian took up his youngest child, an infant of a few months old, and dropped it overboard; and while the shark was devouring it, the rest of the party gained the shore.
I sat one morning ruminating on the pleasures of solitude in the palace of Seven Islands, and gazed through the window at my solitary man, who was just leaving an old boat he had been repairing, for the purpose of preparing dinner. The wide ocean, which rolled its waves almost to the door of the house, was calm and unruffled, and the yellow beach shone again in the sun’s rays, while Humbug lay stretched out at full length before the door. After contemplating this scene for some time, I rose, and was just turning away from the window, when I descried a man, accompanied by a boy, walking along the sea-shore towards the house. This unusual sight created in me almost as strong, though not so unpleasant, a sensation as was awakened in the bosom of Robinson Crusoe when he discovered the footprint in the sand. Hastily putting on my cap, I ran out to meet him, and found, to my joy, that he was a trapper of my acquaintance; and, what added immensely to the novelty of the thing, he was also a white man and a gentleman! He had entered one of the fur companies on the coast at an early age, and, a few years afterwards, fell in love with an Indian girl, whom he married; and, ultimately, he became a trapper. He was a fine, good-natured man, and had been well educated: and to hear philosophical discourse proceeding from the lips of one who was, in outward appearance, a regular Indian, was very strange indeed. He was dressed in the usual capote, leggins, and moccasins of a hunter.
“What have you got for dinner?” was his first question, after shaking hands with me.
“Pork and pancakes,” said I.
“Oh!” said the trapper; “the first salt, and the latter made of flour and water?”
“Just so; and, with the exception of some bread, and a few ground pease in lieu of coffee, this has been my diet for three weeks back.”
“You might have done better,” said the trapper, pointing towards a blue line in the sea; “look, there are fish enough, if you only took the trouble to catch them.”
As he said this, I advanced to the edge of the water; and there, to my astonishment, discovered that what I had taken for seaweed was a shoal of kippling, so dense that they seemed scarcely able to move.
Upon beholding this, I recollected having seen a couple of old hand-nets in some of the stores, which we immediately sent the trapper’s son (a youth of twelve) to fetch. In a few minutes he returned with them; so, tucking up our trousers, we both went into the water and scooped the fish out by dozens. It required great quickness, however, as they shot into deep water like lightning, and sometimes made us run in so deep that we wet ourselves considerably. Indeed, the sport became so exciting at last, that we gave over attempting to keep our clothes dry; and in an hour we returned home, laden with kippling, and wet to the skin.
The fish, which measured from four to five inches long, were really excellent, and lent an additional relish to the pork, pancakes, and pease coffee!
I prevailed upon the trapper to remain with me during the following week; and a very pleasant time we had of it, paddling about in a canoe, or walking through the woods, while my companion told me numerous anecdotes, with which his memory was stored. Some of these were grave, and some comical; especially one, in which he described a bear-hunt that he and his son had on the coast of Labrador.
He had been out on a shooting expedition, and was returning home in his canoe, when, on turning a headland, he discovered a black bear walking leisurely along the beach. Now the place where he discovered him was a very wild, rugged spot. At the bottom of the bay rose a high precipice, so that Bruin could not escape that way: along the beach, in the direction in which he had been walking, a cape, which the rising tide now washed, prevented his retreating; so that the only chance for the brute to escape was by running past the trapper, within a few yards of him. In this dilemma, the bear bethought himself of trying the precipice; so, collecting himself, he made a bolt for it, and actually managed to scramble up thirty or forty feet, when bang went the boy’s gun; but the shot missed, and it appeared as if the beast would actually get away, when the trapper took a deliberate aim and fired. The effect of the shot was so comical, that the two hunters could scarcely re-load their guns for laughing. Bruin, upon receiving the shot, covered his head with his fore-paws, and, curling himself up like a ball, came thundering down the precipice head over heels, raising clouds of dust, and hurling showers of stones down in his descent, till he actually rolled at the trapper’s feet; and then, getting slowly up, he looked at him with such a bewildered expression, that the man could scarcely refrain from laughter, even while in the act of blowing the beast’s brains out.
This man had also a narrow escape of having a boxing match with a moose-deer or elk. The moose had a strange method of fighting with its fore feet, getting up on its hind legs, and boxing, as it were, with great energy and deadly force. The trapper, upon the occasion referred to, was travelling with an Indian, who, having discovered the track of a moose in the snow, set off in chase of it, while the trapper pursued his way with the Indian’s pack of furs and provisions on his shoulders. He had not gone far when he heard a shot, and the next moment a moose-deer, as large as a horse, sprang through the bushes and stood in front of him. The animal came so suddenly on the trapper that it could not turn; so, rising up with a savage look, it prepared to strike him, when another shot was fired from among the bushes by the Indian, and the moose, springing nearly its own height into the air, fell dead upon the snow.
In chasing the moose during winter in some parts of these countries, where the ground is broken and rugged, the hunters are not unfrequently exposed to the danger of falling over the precipices which the deceptive glare of the snow conceals from view, until, too late, he finds the treacherous snow giving way beneath his feet. On one occasion a young man in the service of the Company received intelligence from an Indian that he had seen fresh tracks of a moose, and being an eager sportsman, he sallied forth, accompanied by the Indian, in chase of it. A long fatiguing walk on the Chipewyan snow-shoes, which are six feet long, brought them within sight of the deer. The young man fired, wounded the animal, and then dashed forward in pursuit. For a long way the deer kept well ahead of them. At length they began to overtake it; but when they were about to fire again, it stumbled and disappeared, sending up a cloud of snow in its fall. Supposing that it had sunk exhausted into one of the many hollows which were formed by the undulations of the ground, the young man rushed headlong towards it, followed at a slower pace by the Indian. Suddenly he stopped and cast a wild glance around him as he observed that he stood on the very brink of a precipice, at the foot of which the mangled carcass of the deer lay. Thick masses of snow had drifted over its edge until a solid wreath was formed, projecting several feet beyond it. On this wreath the young man stood with the points of his long snow-shoes overhanging the yawning abyss; to turn round was impossible, as the exertion requisite to wield such huge snow-shoes would, in all probability, have broken off the mass. To step gently backwards was equally impossible, in consequence of the heels of the shoes being sunk into the snow. In this awful position he stood until the Indian came up, and taking off his long sash, threw the end of it towards him; catching hold of this, he collected all his energies, and giving a desperate bound threw himself backwards at full length. The Indian pulled with all his force on the belt, and succeeded in drawing him out of danger, just as the mass on which he had stood a moment before gave way, and thundered down the cliff, where it was dashed into clouds against the projecting crags long before it reached the foot.
About a week after his arrival the trapper departed, and left me again in solitude.
The last voyage.—There is something very sad and melancholy in these words—the last! The last look, the last word, the last smile, even the last shilling, have all a peculiarly melancholy import; but the last voyage, to one who has lived, as it were, on travelling—who has slept for weeks and months under the shadow of the forest trees, and dwelt among the wild romantic scenes of the wilderness—has a peculiar and thrilling interest. Each tree I passed on leaving shook its boughs mournfully, as if it felt hurt at being thus forsaken. The very rocks seemed to frown reproachfully, while I stood up and gazed wistfully after each well-known object for the last time. Even the wind seemed to sympathise with the rest; for, while it urged the boat swiftly away from my late home, like a faithful friend holding steadfastly on its favouring course, still it fell occasionally, and rose again in gusts and sighs, as if it wished to woo me back again to solitude. I started on this, the last voyage, shortly after the departure of my friend the trapper, leaving the palace in charge of an unfortunate gentleman who brought a wife and five children with him, which rendered Seven Islands a little less gloomy than heretofore. Five men accompanied me in an open boat; and on the morning of the 25th August we took our departure for Tadousac. And, truly, Nature appeared to be aware that it was my last voyage, for she gave us the most unkind and harassing treatment that I ever experienced at her hands.
The first few miles were accomplished pleasantly enough. We had a fair breeze, and not too much of it; but towards the afternoon it shifted, and blew directly against us, so that the men were obliged to take to the oars; and, as the boat was large, it required them all to pull, while I steered.
The men were all French Canadians: a merry, careless, but persevering set of fellows, just cut out for the work they had to do, and, moreover, accustomed to it. The boat was a clumsy affair, with two spritsails and a jigger or mizzen; but, notwithstanding, she looked well at a distance, and though incapable of progressing very fast through the water, she could stand a pretty heavy sea. We were badly off, how ever, with regard to camp gear, having neither tent nor oilcloth to protect us should it rain—indeed, all we had to guard us from the inclemency of the weather at night was one blanket each man; but as the weather had been fine and settled for some time back, we hoped to get along pretty well.
As for provisions, we had pork and flour, besides a small quantity of burnt-pease coffee, which I treasured up as a great delicacy.
Our first encampment was a good one. The night, though dark, was fine and calm, so that we slept very comfortably upon the beach, every man with his feet towards the fire, from which we all radiated like the spokes of a wheel. But our next bivouac was not so good. The day had been very boisterous and wet, so that we lay down to rest in damp clothes, with the pleasant reflection that we had scarcely advanced ten miles. The miseries of our fifth day, however, were so numerous and complicated that it at last became absurd! It was a drizzly damp morning to begin with; soon this gave way to a gale of contrary wind, so that we could scarcely proceed at the rate of half a mile an hour; and in the evening we were under the necessity either of running back five miles to reach a harbour, or of anchoring off an exposed lee-shore. Preferring the latter course, even at the risk of losing our boat altogether, we cast anchor, and leaving a man in the boat, waded ashore. Here things looked very wretched indeed. Everything was wet and clammy. Very little firewood was to be found; and when it was found, we had the greatest difficulty in getting it to light. At last, however, the fire blazed up; and though it still rained, we began to feel, comparatively speaking, comfortable.
Now, it must have been about midnight when I awoke, wheezing and sniffling with a bad cold, and feeling uncommonly wretched—the fire having gone out, and the drizzly rain having increased—and while I was endeavouring to cover myself a little better with a wet blanket, the man who had been left to watch the boat rushed in among us, and said that it had been driven ashore, and would infallibly go to pieces if not shoved out to sea immediately. Up we all got, and rushing down to the beach, were speedily groping about in the dark, up to our waists in water, while the roaring breakers heaved the boat violently against our breasts. After at least an hour of this work, we got it afloat again, and returned to our beds, where we lay shivering in wet clothes till morning.
We had several other nights nearly as bad as this one; and once or twice narrowly escaped being smashed to pieces among rocks and shoals, while travelling in foggy weather.
Even the last day of the voyage had something unpleasant in store for us. As we neared the mouth of the river Saguenay the tide began to recede, and ere long the current became so strong that we could not make headway against it; we had no alternative, therefore, but to try to run ashore, there to remain until the tide should rise again. Now it so happened that a sand-bank caught our keel just as we turned broadside to the current, and the water, rushing against the boat with the force of a mill-race, turned it up on one side, till it stood quivering, as if undecided whether or not to roll over on top of us. A simultaneous rush of the men to the elevated side decided the question, and caused it to fall squash down on its keel again, where it lay for the next four or five hours, being left quite dry by the tide. As this happened within a few miles of our journey’s end, I left the men to take care of the boat, and walked along the beach to Tadousac.
Here I remained some time, and then travelled through the beautiful lakes of Canada and the United States to New York. But here I must pause. As I said before, I write not of civilised but of savage life; and having now o’ershot the boundary, it is time to close.
On the 25th of May 1847 I bade adieu to the Western hemisphere, and sailed for England in the good ship New York. The air was light and warm, and the sun unclouded, as we floated slowly out to sea, and ere long the vessel bathed her swelling bows in the broad Atlantic.
Gradually, as if loath to part, the wood-clad shores of America grew faint and dim; I turned my eyes, for the last time, upon the distant shore: the blue hills quivered for a moment on the horizon, as if to bid us all a long farewell, and then sank into the liquid bosom of the ocean.
The End.
| 欢迎访问英文小说网 |