SOME LABRADOR RIVERS 
This was the most extensive bog of all, and 
although we were occasionally encouraged by 
dog signs which showed that we were going 
in the direction taken by the dog-sledges in 
winter, we had begun to be very sceptical 
as to the existence of the river at all, for 
we had trudged on for five hours, and we had 
been told that the river was only five miles off. 
These, however, were winter miles with a foot- 
ing of ice and snow for fast-running dogs. 
Suddenly right before us, sweeping across our 
path was the river, and this view alone well 
repaid us for all our efforts. There was a 
sudden drop in the tundra, a big snowbank, a 
fringe of birches just leafing out in delicate 
green, and waving their yellow tassels of cat- 
kins to the breeze, a few spires of spruces almost 
black in comparison, and then, — but a stone’s 
throw away, and forty or fifty feet below us, — 
the mighty river, dark blue but flecked with 
whitecaps, flowing swiftly to the westward. 
Its breadth was about a third of a mile, and 
beyond stretched a great plain of dark green 
spruce forest, — the typical forest of the Hud- 
sonian zone, dark, impenetrable, mysterious. 
A small winding branch stream entered the 
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