These Exploits I Had To Find
Out For Myself Later On, But Much More Important To Me At The Time
Was The Fact That He Was A First-Class Cook, A Steady, Cheerful
Worker, And A Capable Guide As Far As Great Slave Lake.
The Athabaska below Fort MacMurray is a noble stream, one-third
of a mile wide, deep, steady, unmarred; the banks are covered with
unbroken virginal forests of tall white poplar, balsam poplar,
spruce, and birch.
The fire has done no damage here as yet, the
axe has left no trace, there are no houses, no sign of man except
occasional teepee poles. I could fancy myself floating down the
Ohio two hundred years ago.
These were bright days to be remembered, as we drifted down
its placid tide in our ample and comfortable boat, with abundance
of good things. Calm, lovely, spring weather; ducks all along the
river; plenty of food, which is the northerner's idea of bliss;
plenty of water, which is the river-man's notion of joy; plenty
of leisure, which is an element in most men's heaven, for we had
merely to float with the stream, three miles an hour, except when
we landed to eat or sleep.
The woods were donning their vernal green and resounded with the
calls of birds now. The mosquito plague of the region had not yet
appeared, and there was little lacking to crown with a halo the
memory of those days on the Missouri of the North.
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