I Fear I Should Be A Poor One To Stand Starvation,
If So Slight A Brunt Should Play Such Havoc With My Strength.
We set out early to retrace the course of the Nyarling, which in
spite of associated annoyances and disappointments will ever shine
forth in my memory as the "Beautiful River."
It is hard, indeed, for words to do it justice. The charm of a
stream is always within three feet of the surface and ten feet of
the bank. The broad Slave, then, by its size wins in majesty but
must lose most all its charm; the Buffalo, being fifty feet wide,
has some waste water; but the Nyarling, half the size, has its
birthright compounded and intensified in manifold degree. The water
is clear, two or three feet deep at the edge of the grassy banks,
seven to ten feet in mid-channel, without bars or obstructions
except the two log-jambs noted, and these might easily be removed.
The current is about one mile and a half an hour, so that canoes
can readily pass up or down; the scenery varies continually and is
always beautiful. Everything that I have said of the Little Buffalo
applies to the Nyarling with fourfold force, because of its more
varied scenery and greater range of bird and other life. Sometimes,
like the larger stream, it presents a long, straight vista of a
quarter-mile through a solemn aisle in the forest of mighty spruce
trees that tower a hundred feet in height, all black with gloom,
green with health, and gray with moss.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 110 of 252
Words from 29079 to 29343
of 67135
