210 LOCUSTS AND WILD HONEY 



and upon it I floated out upon the lake, whipping 

 its waters right and left, morning, noon, and night. 

 Many fine trout came to my hand, and were released 

 because they did not fill the hill. 



The lake became my favorite resort, while my 

 companion preferred rather the shore or the long 

 still pool above, where there was a rude makeshift 

 of a boat, made of common box-boards. 



Upon the lake you had the wildness and solitude 

 at arm's length, and could better take their look and 

 measure. You became something apart from them ; 

 you emerged and had a vantage ground like that of 

 a mountain peak, and could contemplate them at 

 your ease. Seated upon my raft and slowly car- 

 ried by the current or drifted by the breeze, I had 

 many a long, silent look into the face of the wil- 

 derness, and found the communion good. I was 

 alone with the spirit of the forest-bound lakes and 

 felt its presence and magnetism. I played hide-and- 

 seek with it about the nooks and corners, and lay in 

 wait for it upon a little island crowned with a clump 

 of trees that was moored just to one side the current 

 near the head of the lake. 



Indeed, there is no depth of solitude that the 

 mind does not endow with some human interest. As 

 in a dead silence the ear is filled with its own mur- 

 mur, so amid these aboriginal scenes one's feelings 

 and sympathies become external to him, as it were, 

 and he holds converse with them. Then a lake is 

 the ear as well as the eye of a forest. It is the place 

 to go to listen and ascertain what sounds are abroad 



