SUNSET AND SUNRISE ON LAKE ONTARIO. 47 



the motionless figure of a heron standing on a fallen 

 cedar overhanging the margin of the water. When 

 our approach disturbed her night-watch for prey, she 

 ■spread her grey wings and noiselessly flew onward to 

 take her stand once more on some other prostrate tree. 

 There was a sort of witch-like weirdness about this 

 lonely watcher of the waters, such that I could not help 

 but follow her silent, mysterious flight and observe the 

 shadow of her wings upon the lake. 



Fascinated by the bird, I watched her until weariness 

 overtook my senses, when my eyes closed and I slept so 

 soundly that it was not till the clanging bell gave notice 

 to the passengers that we were nearing the site of the 

 frontier town of Cobourg that I awoke. 



If the night had been lovely, so also was the dawn, as 

 the sun rose in robes of the most exquisite colors. The 

 boat was now bearing in nearer to the shores of what 

 appeared to be a rolling country, all clothed with forest 

 green. Hill rising above hill came out from the clouds 

 of morning mist, far away to the distant northern limits 

 of the horizon, till mingling with the grey they melted 

 into a mere cloud line to the eye. 



Around us, gilded by the rays of the rising sun, the 

 smooth surface of the lake shone like a sea of gold, the 

 spray from the paddle-wheels catching a thousand rain- 

 bow hues as it fell. Surpassingly beautiful were the 

 clouds of mist as they broke into all sorts of fanciful 

 forms, rising higher and higher, anon taking the appear- 



