THROUGH CANADIAN WILDS 



295 



A TOBBER'S CAMP IX THE HEART OF WINTER 



morning I remember feeling chilly but 

 was too sleepy to really wake up. When 

 1 did, I felt the most delicious warmth 

 and as it did not seem very light I lay 

 there enjoying the sensation for a few 

 minutes, then throwing aside the blan- 

 kets looked out and found that about 

 eight inches of snow had fallen in the 

 night and completely buried us. 



My man complained of feeling sick, 

 but as he had no temperature and his 

 pulse was good I was rather inclined, 

 especially after I saw the breakfast 

 which he ate, to think it only a case of 

 "cold feet." However, we decided to 

 stay in camp for the day and leaving 

 him in his bag, I pitched the tent, cut 

 some boughs for beds and wood for the 

 fire and packed our loads so that they 

 would be easy to carry and spent the 

 afternoon taking them as far up the 

 lake as I could without running into 

 bad going. The ice on the lake would 

 not bear and as it seemed to be getting 



colder the ice would probably be much 

 thicker in the morning. 



Next day, the invalid feeling better, 

 we loaded our camp outfit into the 

 canoe and hitching a tump line to the 

 bow, one of us dragged it from in 

 front, the other pushing behind, we 

 went to the place where I had taken 

 the duffle and loaded that in too. In 

 case the ice gave way we expected to 

 jump into the canoe. Nothing happened 

 and we reached the other end of the 

 lake. There the portage, about two 

 miles long went right up the mountain 

 in order to pass a beautiful fall, nearly 

 sixty feet high. As we were heavily 

 loaded and it was probable that we 

 should find the next lake frozen, I took 

 the snowshoes and a stove for our two 

 loads, leaving the canoe for the second 

 trip. There was about eight inches of 

 snow and the going was pretty hard. 

 When we reached Lake Virginia we 

 found it partly frozen, and as the nexr 



