OR, THE LAKE LANDS OF CANADA. 179 



this ground had been occupied as an Indian camp within a 

 few years. The most of die large trees had then disap- 

 peared, but since that time a thick underbrush had sprung 

 up. The captain remembered that an Indian tribe had 

 located here about ten years previously, engaged in the 

 manufacture of maple-sugar during a single season, and 

 then departed for parts to him unknown. It was this fact 

 which had given the name (Sugar-Bush) to the lake that 

 was situated about half a mile from our camp. We dis- 

 covered about here many old birch-bark vessels, some of 

 which were employed by them to receive the sap as it 

 came from the trees, and others that had evidently been 

 used to transport it from the trees to the spot where it 

 was evaporated, or " boiled down," as the backwoodsmen 

 say. 



The weather during our stay in this camp, prior to 

 taking our departure for the reconnoissance, was exceed- 

 ingly changeable. One day it might rain. The next would 

 probably give us a variety; thus, in the morning it might be 

 cloudy, but before noon we might get rain, snow, and hail, 

 followed by a cold night and the formation of ice. In other 

 cases the rainfalls were accompanied with heavy thunder 

 and followed by warm sunshine. This sort of weather was 

 not encouraging to any party of sportsmen contemplating 

 cutting loose from their base, leaving behind them tents and 

 blankets, sleeping in the woods without shelter, and all this 

 exposure and hardship merely for the love of the chase. 

 Furthermore, the reader should at this point fully under- 

 stand that even now we are having very fine sport. Since 

 our arrival here we have killed many deer, have taken 



