xiv ADVENTURES IN FIELD AND FOREST 189 



overgrown with shrubs and low trees, yet sufficiently high to 

 shelter me from the chilling dews ; and being but a few yards 

 distance from my vessel, here I fixed my encampment. A 

 brisk wind arising from the lake drove away the clouds of 

 mosquitoes into the thickets. Now, with difficulty and 

 industry, I collected a sufficiency of dry wood to keep up a 

 light during the night, and to roast some trout which I had 

 caught when descending the river ; their heads I stewed in 

 the juice of oranges, which, with boiled rice, afforded me a 

 wholesome and delicious supper : I hung the remainder of 

 my broiled fish on the snags of some shrubs over my head. 

 At last, after reconnoitring my habitation, I returned, spread 

 abroad my skins and blanket upon the clean sands by my fire 

 side, and betook myself to repose. 



How glorious is the powerful sun, minister of the Most 

 High, as he leaves our hemisphere, retiring from our sight 

 beyond the western forests ! I behold with gratitude his 

 departing smiles. 



At midnight I awake ; when, raising my head erect, I find 

 myself alone in the wilderness of Florida, on the shores of 

 Lake George. When quite awake, I start at the heavy tread 

 of some animal ; the dry limbs of trees upon the ground 

 crackle under his feet ; the close shrubby thickets part and 

 bend under him as he rushes off. I rekindle my sleepy fire. 

 The bright flame ascends and illuminates the ground and 

 groves around me. Then looking up I find my fish carried 

 off, though I thought them safe on the shrubs just over my 

 head, but their scent, carried to a great distance by the damp 

 nocturnal breezes, was I suppose too powerful an attraction 

 to the rapacious wolf. How much easier might it have been 

 for him to have leaped upon my breast in the dead of sleep, 

 and torn my throat, than to have made protracted and 

 circular approaches, and then after espying the fish over my 

 head, with the greatest caution and silence to rear up, and 

 take them off the snags one by one, and that so cunningly as 

 not to awaken me until he had fairly accomplished his purpose. 



He travelled much among the Indians. On one 

 occasion he writes : 



It was drawing on towards the close of day, the skies serene 

 and calm, and gentle zephyrs breathing through the fragrant 

 pines ; the prospect around enchantingly beautiful ; endless 

 green savannas, chequered with coppices of fragrant shrubs. 

 Nature seemed silent, and nothing appeared to ruffle the 



