CAMPING OUT. 291 



lessly pitched into the back part of the camp, had been 

 burned with the fir boughs ; so our beverage that morn- 

 ing was an infusion of hemlock boughs, a few sprays of 

 which were boiled in water — one of the many devices 

 adopted in the woods as substitutes for tea. Morning 

 disclosed, moreover, a patch of the broad, sickly-looking 

 green leaves of the poison-ivy (Rhus toxicodendron), 

 growing hard by where we had reposed, contact with 

 which would have driven us wild with dangerous irrita- 

 tion. On returning to the sea-pools, however, our miseries 

 were somewhat compensated by killing five dozen newly 

 run sea trout at a pretty stand in a wild meadow, where 

 a cool brook joined the river. 



Apropos of the flies which have been just alluded to, 

 none of his relations could have identified my companion 

 (a novice in the woods) next morning. So swollen was 

 his whole countenance that features were obliterated, and 

 for nearly the whole day he was helplessly blind. Many 

 people sufier similarly ; others enjoy comparative immu- 

 nity from swelling, though copiously bled. On landing 

 from a canoe, the only plan is to light a fire, and make 

 as dense a smoke as possible. Lime juice, petroleum, 

 pork fat, or tar are used, according to fancy, to smear 

 the face and hands as preventives, but the flies will 

 scarcely be denied by such appliances. On salmon- 

 fishing excursions of extended duration on the Nepisiquit 

 and elsewhere, I have generally taken mosquito curtains 

 to cover one's body at night. By day I and the insects 

 fififht it out in a continuous tussle. In a recent number 

 of Land and Water, however, I find a receipt given by 

 my friend " Ubique," an old hand at " camping out," 



which, though I have not had an opportunity of trying 



u 2 



