JACK-SHOOTING IN A FOGGY NIGHT. 185 



embarrassment iu expressing myself. In the mean 

 while Martin was meeting with difficulty. The 

 bank of the river was steep, and the light cedar 

 shell, with only himself in it, was out of all bal- 

 ance, and hard to manage. It may be that his 

 very strong desire to get on to that meadow 

 where I was holding his deer for him operated 

 to confuse and embarrass his movements ! He 

 woiild propel the boat at fuU speed toward the 

 bank, then jump for the bow; but his motion 

 forward would release the boat from the mud, 

 and when he reached the bow the boat would be 

 half-way across the river again. Now Martin is a 

 man of great patience. He is not by any means a 

 profane person. He had always shown great re- 

 spect for the cloth. But everybody will see that 

 his position was a very trying one. Three several 

 times, as he afterward informed me, did he drive 

 that boat into the bank, and three several times, 

 when he got to the bow, that boat was in the mid- 

 dle of the river. At last Martin's patience gave 

 way, and out of the fog came to my ears ejacula- 

 tions of ■ disgust, and such strong expletives as 

 are found only in choice old English, and howls 

 of rage and disappointment that none but a guide 

 could utter in like circumstances. But human 

 endurance has a limit. I was fast reaching a 

 condition of mind when family pride and trans- 

 mitted powers of resolution fail. What did I care 



