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CHAPTER XVI. 



PRAIRIE-FIRES TERROR AND FLIGHT OF WILD ANIMALS CARIBOO- 

 TRACKS SPONGY SOIL UNSUCCESSFUL STALK LARGE GREY WOLF 



WILD DUCKS SIGNS OF A CHANGE OF WEATHER WILD GEESE 



MOOSE RIVER CONSTRUCTION OF A RAFT VOYAGE OF DISCOVERY 



BIRCH-BARK CANOES. 



THE sky last night was brilliantly illuminated, so 

 much so that I could not help surmising that the 

 scrub, for such is the nature of the vegetation we are 

 now come to, was on fire. This morning confirmed 

 my surmises. Heavy clouds hung on the horizon, 

 rolling over each other, and swallowing up their 

 predecessors like the fresh waves of ocean. Up to 

 windward a lurid glare, deepening in intensity, as 

 unnatural and forbidding as one might imagine if the 

 earth were being destroyed by fire, advanced towards 

 us. The smell of burning soon became sickening, and 

 the sound made by the conflagration in effecting 

 its work of destruction was heard like the hum of 

 traffic in a large city. 



It is an uncommon occurrence for such fires to 

 take place so early in the season. Spring had made 

 vegetation unusually damp, while no protracted dry 

 summer had followed to parch it. In my lengthened 

 experience, I do not remember an instance of such 



