i 9 4 A SPORTSMAN'S EDEN. 



having given up all hope of the advent of white 

 hunters for this season, have gone off to their 

 winter shooting-grounds some hundreds of miles 

 back in the forests. 



For almost the first time that I remember in 

 Canada there is no sun shining. The town is 

 only six years old, and its site very imperfectly 

 cleared. The hotel itself rises from a rough 

 boulder-strewn building-lot, not yet made level ; 

 the wooden trottoirs rise a couple of feet 

 above the thoroughfares, in which only so much 

 ground is cleared as is actually needed for traffic ; 

 boulders and tree-stumps still cumber the ground, 

 and through all sweeps a broad gray river, sheeted 

 in mist, and fringed near the town with a long 

 line of red canoes beached for the year. 



Low hills, covered with hard wood, abut on 

 the river ; and wooded hills and timber-limits 

 stretch far away on all sides. 



The day looks dim and gray, the river lifeless 

 and desolate, the hills forbidding ; the sun has a 

 thick haze round it, and there is promise of snow 

 in the air. In the few shop-windows nothing is 

 to be seen except furs and sealskin moccasins. 

 A cart in the yard is being taken off its wheels 

 and being mounted on ' runners.' 



The last leaves of autumn have fallen ; the 

 sugar-maple has lost its gold and crimson, and 



