84 THROUGH CANADA 



green with the seeds that had found foothold there. 

 An occasional Norwegian pine towered from the 

 bare bank, proudly proclaiming its victory over the 

 flood that had swept away its less hardy fellows. 

 Its roots had struck too deeply to be moved by 

 wind or water. 



We had luncheon on one of the islands, where 

 my Indian guide showed a rare genius in the 

 culinary art. A few slashes of an old knife with 

 a villainous look about it suggestive of other uses, 

 removed the backbone of a bass and pickerel. The 

 deftness of the strokes showed an inherited aptitude 

 for scalping, becoming the son of a chief. Soon the 

 blue smoke of the kindling logs rose from the 

 island, and with it the odour of delicious viands, 

 bass, pickerel, tea, fruit. Here was ambrosia, the 

 very food of the gods waiting on little less than 

 fiendish appetites. Oh, what a luncheon ! ! . . . 



Towards evening I had expectations of a fight 

 with a maskalonge. We had caught bass, small- 

 mouthed and large-mcuthed, and a rock species with 

 little fight in it compared with the others. But what 

 a handsome fellow he was, with deep blue eyes and 

 carmine irises ! A dorsal fin exceptionally large 

 with eleven rigid rays and eleven soft. Underneath 

 there was a fin with six rigid rays and eleven soft. 

 Beneath the throat the pectoral fins met in a fan- 

 shape of artistic design, with five rigid rays in each. 

 All these trimmings surmounted by a head and body 



