334 " PRAIRIE AND FOREST. 



tant hills fringed with giant timber. On either side, isl- 

 ands after islands dot the bosom of the water, while ver- 

 dant mountains and primeval forests stretch far, far beyond 

 the limits allotted to vision. The two or three hours which 

 are taken to cross the lake will flit by rapidly. If you have 

 appreciation of what is sublime, of what Nature in her 

 grand conceptions formed, the impressions indented on the 

 tablets of your memory will doubtless be permanent. It 

 matters not how skeptical and unbelieving some may be, 

 place them where the giant works of the Creator are vis- 

 ible, and how insignificant forever after must they view the 

 puny efforts and constructions of their fellow-beings, and 

 cease to doubt that there is One above omnipotent and all- 

 powerful ! 



Fail not, on reaching the centre of the lake, to face about 

 and look for the White Mountains,* and, if the day is clear, 

 ample will be your recompense; for, towering high above 

 all other competitors, they smile gloriously over the laud- 

 scape, softened into a dreamy reality by distance, and fur- 

 rowed on their summits by lines of virgin snow, reflecting 

 a thousand brilliant prismatic colorings. But the irrevo- 

 cable pace of time glides on, and pleasure flits with rapid 

 stride. Our nondescript boat now appears to head direct 

 on shore, and so we advance till, when within a few yards 

 of the rocks, the helm is put hard down, and we quickly 

 turn to the left and enter the Androscoggin, up whose wa- 

 ters a most charming vista is beheld, the drooping limbs of 

 the trees on either side playfully kissing the rippling stream, 

 and the irregularly-formed rocks splitting the water, and 

 diverting its course in tangent lines, making many a min- 

 iature whirlpool or gurgling eddy, the haunt and breeding- 

 place of innumerable trout. If the river is sufficiently high, 



* Mount Washington is six thousand feet high. 



