264 JOHN LEDYARD. 



Lad acquired considerable knowledge of Indian 

 manners and customs; but, at the same time, he 

 had come to the deliberate conclusion not to spend 

 his life as a missionary to the savages. He secretly 

 determined to abandon that project and the college 

 together ; and he executed his purpose after a fashion, 

 peculiarly his own. 



His first step was to cut down one of the immense 

 forest- trees which reared its lofty summit toward 

 heaven a short distance in the rear of the institution. 

 The trunk of this tree he gradually fashioned into 

 the shape of a canoe. The length of his craft was 

 fifty feet; its breadth was three. With the assist- 

 ance of some of his fellow-students, he succeeded 

 in digging out the interior of the mass, and at last 

 this singular product of his skill and labor was 

 completed. His companions then aided him in 

 launching it upon the Connecticut River. 



It was Ledyard's purpose, by means of this sin- 

 gular conveyance, to return to Hartford, and to float 

 down the current of a stream with which he was 

 totally unacquainted. He provided himself with a 

 oearskin as a cover from the inclemency of the 

 weather; and with a sufficient stock of provisions, 

 copies of the Greek Testament and Ovid, and a 

 paddle, he commenced this strange, adventurous 

 voyage. He was carried forward by the river in safety 



