228 HUNTERS OF THE GREAT NORTH 



undertook to walk the added weight of the rifle would be 

 a burden. 



The night after my discovery of this deserted cabin 

 I was as usual sleeping on my raft as it drifted. 

 Midsummer was now long past; furthermore, I was 

 traveling south so that it was dark for two or three hours 

 around midnight. Because of the uncertainty of every- 

 thing I never slept soundly. Now I was awakened by 

 what I took at first for the rustle of leaves. I was lying 

 quietly locking up at the stars and listening to what 

 sounded like wind among trees, when it suddenly oc- 

 curred to me that this could not be the sound of any 

 wind for there were no leaves to rustle — an evergreen 

 forest makes no such sound as that made by aspen leaves 

 or those of other deciduous trees. 



If it was not the noise of leaves it must be the only 

 logical noise of the same sort that one may hear in this 

 locality — the murmur of a rapid or a waterfall. It was 

 so dark that I could not see the land clearly on either 

 bank of the river and apparently the stream at this par- 

 ticular point was especially wide. I had no idea on 

 which side the rapids would be worse, but knew that the 

 most favorable place to run them would be where the 

 current was strongest. The chances were that my raft 

 would keep to the strongest current and would find a 

 safe place (if there was one) if I left it to its own 

 course. 



It was a tense half hour as I sat motionless in the 



middle of my raft with the noise of the rapids gradually 



increasing. I don't think it ever became loud enough 



to deserve the name of a roar but it sounded quite loud 



»ugh to make me feel uncomfortable. 



When I got almost to the rapids the current had taken 



