376 TKAVEL, ADVENTUEE, AND SPORT. 



now directed, and we at last reached it, after a great 

 deal of trouble with our baggage-animals, whose packs 

 were continually tumbling off. Fortunately there 

 was nothing of any value contained in them, or the 

 combined effects of soaking in the rivers and rolling 

 over precipices would have been fatal. We were 

 amply repaid by the beauty of the valley of the 

 Tecumseh, for the difficulty we had experienced in 

 scrambling down to it. The path led through the 

 wood by the river -bank, sometimes diving into a 

 glen, and crossing gushing tributaries by rustic 

 wooden bridges ; sometimes, descending to the level 

 of the stream, it was shut in by rocks and overhang- 

 ing trees ; at others, where the channel became com- 

 pressed, and the banks rugged and precipitous, it 

 ascended to a height of a hundred feet, and, round- 

 ing the projecting rock, afforded romantic glimpses 

 of roaring cascades and boiling rapids ; then through 

 the open smiling valley, where hedges of gigantic box 

 were covered with the wild clematis, and azaleas and 

 rhododendrons mingled their glowing blossoms. 



Surely nature has lavished an undue share of her 

 gifts upon the lovely valley of Tecumseh. Xever 

 was there such a combination of the sublime and the 

 beautiful. As we followed its course, we seemed to 

 pass from one to the other : we left behind us the 

 snowy peaks, and journeyed onward towards gently 

 swelling hills; issuing from deep narrow gorges 

 re-echoincr with the hoarse murmur of flooded tor- 



