268 CANADIAN NIGHTS 



says John ; " guess I will take a little nap now — 

 moon get up by and by ; " and in another instant 

 he was fast asleep. Indians have a wonderful 

 faculty for going to sleep. They seem to shut 

 themselves up at will, with a snap like slamming 

 down the lid of a box with a spring, and are fast 

 asleep in a second ; and there they will lie, snoring 

 and shivering with cold until you touch or call 

 them, and then they are wide awake in an in- 

 stant, as if they pressed some knob concealed in 

 their internal mechanism, and flew suddenly open 

 again. 



I remember seeing a curious instance of re- 

 fraction once myself. We were paddling home 

 one evening, old John and I, along a still deep 

 reach of dead water, gliding dreamily over a surface 

 literally as smooth as a polished mirror. It was 

 evening, and the sun was only just clear of the 

 tree-tops on the western side. Happening to look 

 up, I saw on the eastern side a shadow, a stooping 

 form, glide across the trees about twenty or thirty 

 feet from the ground and disappear. It looked 

 very ghost-like, and for an instant it startled me. 

 In a few seconds it reappeared, and, the trees 

 growing thicker together and affording a better 

 background, I saw the shadows plainly — two 



