BIRCH BROWSINGS 



Kill to its source, and encamped by Balsam 

 Lake. A cold and protracted rainstorm 

 coming on, we were obliged to leave the 

 woods before we were ready. Neither of us 

 will soon forget that tramp by an unknown 

 route over the mountains, encumbered as 

 we were with a hundred and one superflui- 

 ties which we had foolishly brought along 

 to solace ourselves with in the woods ; nor 

 that halt on the summit, where we cooked 

 and ate our fish in a drizzling rain ; nor, 

 again, that rude log house, with its sweet 

 hospitality, which we reached just at night- 

 fall on Mill Brook. 



In 1868 a party of three of us set out 

 for a brief trouting excursion to a body of 

 water called Thomas's Lake, situated in the 

 same chain of mountains. On this excur- 

 sion, more particularly than on any other 

 I have ever undertaken, I was taught how 

 poor an Indian I should make, and what a 

 ridiculous figure a party of men may cut in 

 the woods when the way is uncertain and 

 the mountains high. 



We left our team at a farmhouse near the 



head of the Mill Brook, one June afternoon, 



and with knapsacks on our shoulders struck 



into the woods at the base of the mountain, 



91 



