LAKE SUPERIOR. 123 



On the north shore, amid the interminable forests 

 that stretch in primeval solitude to the northern 

 sea, enlivened only with the voice of the Peebiddy 

 bird and one other melancholy warbler, beautified 

 by a rare sprinkling of n-ative wild-flowers, 



" In the kingdom of Wabasso, 

 In the land of the white rabbit," 



and along the Canadian shore of the lake, is the para- 

 dise of the fly-fisher. Every river swarms, every bay 

 is a reservoir of magnificent fish that find their 

 equals in size, courage, vigor, and beauty only in 

 the salt waters of New Brunswick and Lower 

 Canada. The entire coast is one long fishing-sta- 

 tion, the rivers are stew-ponds, and the lake one 

 vast preserve ; at every step the angler may cast 

 his fly into some eddy of the discolored stream or 

 over some rocky shoal of the limpid lake with a fair 

 prospect of alluring from the depths a glorious em- 

 bodiment of piscatory power that shall struggle and 

 fight, leaping from the water, and making many 

 fierce rushes for a good twenty minutes, till he 

 yields himself to the embrace of the net, exhibiting 

 amid its brown folds the glorious silver brilliancy of 

 the loveliest inhabitant of the liquid element. As 

 he advances along the shore, an endless variety of 

 water and land, continuous changes of rock and 

 tree, and dark, bottomless depths or light gray 

 shallows, present themselves to his eye ; at one mo- 

 ment he is clambering along the steep, rough side 

 of a precipice, whence he can scarcely toss his line 



