168 FISHING GOSSIP. 
end, which did not reach to the bottom of the lake, 
but enabled us to steer our course by means of the 
dense masses of weeds growing out of the mud, or 
suspended in the water. Sometimes a floating island 
of several yards in diameter offered a punctum majoris 
resistentic, but soon disappeared beneath the pressure 
of the oar. Nothing can be more singular than to 
see the grassy margin of the lake, just as the boat 
seems on the point of landing there, disappear be- 
neath its weight, and continue yielding before its 
advance, which it does to such an extent that in 
some places one may push the boat for sixty or 
seventy yards over this floating meadow. 
The lake is cheerful enough on a bright day, its 
surface being dotted over with water-lilies, the pure 
white colour of which beautifully contrasts with the 
brown, non-transparent water, and with the black 
coots swimming and diving in hundreds between 
them. But on a stormy day it has a very different 
and a most desolate aspect. Venturing out in bad 
weather, we found the wind blowing so hard against 
us, that we could not reach the landing-place with 
our unmanageable boat, and so were obliged to cross 
the lake, which was covered with white foam, and to 
work our way through a narrow channel cut in the 
crust for such emergencies ; the latter, meantime, by 
its continued and regular heaving, showed clearly 
that it rested on deep water. 
