IN AUDUBON'S LABRADOR 



River as he expected, was unable to penetrate 

 into the thick tangle more than a couple of 

 hundred yards. 



The foot of the Grand Portage at the inlet 

 was crossed by a narrow brook of the clearest, 

 coolest water, and I drank where doubtless 

 many Indians had drunk before me. The path 

 led up over steep rocks to an elevated plateau 

 from which there was a good view of the forest 

 below and the inlet. Here I found a camping- 

 ground marked by the circles where a dozen 

 or more wigwams had stood, still carpeted 

 with balsam boughs now leafless. In the cen- 

 ter of each circle short stakes had been driven 

 into the ground. On these a little sheet-iron 

 stove had stood, a more convenient form of 

 family hearth than the old open fire. The 

 smoke from the stove is conducted out through 

 a small iron pipe. I searched about this camp- 

 site and found the broken stock of a cheap 

 Hudson's Bay Company's gun, a single cari- 

 bou antler chipped with a knife, gulls' and 

 ducks' feathers, and long shavings and props 

 where canoes were built. A singular wooden 

 implement shaped like a large wooden dumb- 

 bell puzzled me, but I afterwards learned that 



198 



