NARRATIVE. 61 



unpainted settle, and the wide niche for the capacious stove, now 

 stowed away for the summer, had all a cosy and liveable look. And 

 Mr. Swanston, although he had inhabited this wild country in the 

 service of the H. B. C., at one or another of their posts, over twenty 

 years, yet for anything in his manner or appearance (unless it were 

 that he wore moccasins instead of slippers ) might have left the pave- 

 ment of Fenchurch Street only yesterday. 



The life at these posts is a very quiet, and, doubtless, monotonous 

 one ; busy during the seasons when the hunters come for their sup- 

 plies, or to bring in their furs ; at other times, with only the fish 

 to be seen to when the nets are drawn in the morning, some to 

 be cleaned and salted, if there is a good haul, and perhaps put into 

 barrels to be sent to the Sault. An arrival from some other post, a 

 straggling party of explorers for copper, and above all, an occasional 

 packet of newspapers from below, these are the great events. In 

 such a life, a man changes slowly, but gathers moss in another sense 

 than that of the proverb. 



A few hundred yards above the factory are very pretty falls, on 

 the Magpie River, * which here empties into the main stream. Two 

 miles up there was said to be a fine cascade, and a still more re- 

 markable one fifteen miles up, which could be reached by a short 

 cut of six miles by land. 



Neither the love of the picturesque however, nor the interests of 

 science, could tempt us into the woods, so terrible were the black flies. 

 This pest of flies, which all the way hither had confined our ramblings 

 on shore pretty closely to the rocks and the beach, and had been grow- 

 ing constantly worse and worse, here reached its climax. Although 

 detained nearly two days, in order to supply the place of the 

 Professor's canoe, (too small for his accommodation, and moreover 

 rotten and unserviceable,) with a larger and fresh one, which had 

 first to be put in order, yet we could only sit with folded hands, or 

 employ ourselves in arranging specimens, and such other occupations 

 as could be pursued in camp, and under the protection of a 



*The magpie of these regions, bye the bye, is no magpie at .all, but a jay (Ganrulua 

 Canadensis), the " moose-bird" or " carrion-bird " of our lumberers ; a confusion that 

 might lead to error as to the range of the American magpie. 



