228 HUNTING CAMPS. 



besides being unlawful, may well be undignified, especially 

 as in the present instance the carter possessed the four feet 

 eleven physique of a Mousqueton. However, we finally 

 slept upon our differences, and the following morning my 

 suggestion that we should make an immediate start was 

 acted on without argument. At the end of the trip the 

 matter, of course, cropped up again, and I was a good deal 

 overcharged, but not to the extent of the first impudent 

 demand for fifty dollars. 



We met with many delays on the road, all occasioned 

 by Mousqueton 's horse, which not only kicked a hole in our 

 canoe, but later overturned the buck-board and its load, 

 and finally conceived so strong a dislike to its owner 

 and its duties as to necessitate our packing every pound 

 of our outfit along the last miles of our way. However, 

 everything has an end, and Edward and I at last pitched 

 our camp on a hillside above a small and, I believe, name- 

 less river. Mousqueton departed to resume, as we heard 

 afterwards, his differences with his steed, had the worst of 

 it, and in the end was forced to abandon his buck-board 

 and to return the thirty miles whence he came on foot. 



Meantime, on the loth of October, Ed and I had every- 

 thing "straightened away to rights," and by three o'clock 

 of a beautiful autumn afternoon we set forth to look over 

 the ground. Chastened by the experiences of the previous 

 year, neither of us hoped for any immediate success, but 

 we were resolved to offer an unsparing sacrifice of time 

 and trouble at the shrine of the Wood Gods. 



As we walked on that afternoon the country looked 

 likely, but so had the country round about Lac Briilee 

 when we visited it in the previous season. Our way to the 

 north-east of our camp led us through a wide valley shut 

 in to the west by a high ridge of mountains and to the east 

 by a smaller range. Not far from the centre of it rose 

 three mounds exceedingly suited for reconnoitring purposes. 



