Halcyon Days on Presqu' Isle Bay 3 



the story to his father's cousin, her favourite granddaughter, 

 of the dangers from the Yankee rebels and from the Indians; 

 of the fears of invasion and the loss of her father's small capital ; 

 of the journeying as a young girl up the rapids of the St. Law- 

 rence, the tugging at the ropes by the line-men on the shore, 

 the poling of the boats, and the struggling against the rocks 

 and the currents in the river. Then, too, she told of the night 

 camps at the small landings along the upper river reaches, the 

 passing of the Thousand Islands, and at last their stay at Cat- 

 araqui, where were the Land Office and the Depot for govern- 

 ment supplies. Their final trip up the beautiful Bay of Quinte", 

 the crossing of the Carrying Place to Wellers' Bay and the 

 final location on their allotment beyond the Bay andPresqu'- 

 Isle Point, were all depicted in glowing, if homely, language. 

 As she told of those early years, when the house was at times 

 without flour and of the occasion when Captain Keeler had 

 gone with several others to the mill at Napanee, with their 

 small grist of wheat, and were delayed by stormy w r eather and 

 a breakdown at the mill, and of how during the weary waiting, 

 an Indian had one day paddled his canoe to the shore and asked 

 for bread, the grandmother's eyes had filled at the recollection 

 of how, when she had burst into tears, telling by signs as best 

 she could of how she had no food, and her children were starv- 

 ing, the Indian had turned and said, "You very good squaw," 

 and going to his canoe, tossed a large salmon onto the sandy 

 shore and then paddled away. 



Then came tales of brightening days, when there were larger 

 clearings, arid the virgin soil gave abundant crops; when, as her 

 boys were growing up, the waters of the lake and the rice 

 marshes of the Bay gave to their spears and guns abundant 

 fish and game. The salmon filled the creeks in spawning time, 

 and the waters of the Bay swarmed with trout and whitefish, 

 maskinonge and pickerel; the black duck, the mallard, and teal 

 darkened the waters at early morning, and in springtime the sun 

 was shaded and the trees even broken down by the flocks of 

 purple-breasted wild pigeons. The autumn brought in the 

 hunting season; the deer, which sometimes had become a nui- 

 sance coming into the wheat-fields, now supplied the winter 

 larder with many a haunch of venison. The chronicles retold, 



