RECREATION. 



2 95 



would be a gilded palace of iniquity, 

 sufficiently prominent in a howling 

 wilderness to be readily distinguished. 

 No such place appeared. At last, how- 

 ever, we came to a trail, which, from its 

 trend and position, we knew must lead 

 to Chicagon lake. Nailed to a blacken- 

 ed pine stump was a tin sign flaunting in 

 the clear sunlight the words, " Val. 

 Blatz, Milwaukee Beer." 



A little way off in the woods we saw 

 a small log shanty, and assuming that 

 this banner on the outer stump had 

 some reference to it, we invaded its 



he knew how to fill tin cups with beer, 

 and put them where weary men could 

 get hold of them. And he did it. Selah! 

 At the head of Chicagon lake we got 

 dinner, at a sort of half-way house — 

 half way between Crystal Falls and 

 Iron river, between civilization and 

 savagery, between comfort and misery — 

 and then visited an Indian village near 

 by. I was deeply interested in the work 

 of an old sachem, who was building a 

 birch canoe. His tools were the sim- 

 plest — an axe and a knife — and all his 

 materials were such as could be gath- 



" HE PICKED UP HIS RIFLE AND FIRED. 



doorway. It was indeed a saloon, but 

 one whose insidious allurements could 

 hardly be classed as dangerous. There 

 was but one room ; that was about 12 

 feet square, and floored with a portion 

 of the broad bosom of Mother Earth. 

 Near the door stood two beer kegs, one 

 on top of the other, and from the upper 

 one, extending to a chink in the wall, 

 there was a rough pine board, on which 

 were some tin cups, ready for a baccha- 

 nalian orgy. Behind this bar stood the 

 bartender. He did not wear diamonds, 

 nor a white apron ; in fact nothing that 

 he wore was, at that time, white. But 



ered within half an hour's walk in the 

 woods. With these he built the craft 

 which, of all others, is most thoroughly 

 adapted to its purposes and in sympathy 

 with its surroundings. It is built in the 

 woods, of the woods, and for the woods. 

 Its owner is completely independent ; 

 for where it cannot carry him, he can 

 carry it, and he can thus travel both by 

 flood and field, guided only by his 

 wishes. This independence, however, 

 comes only from thorough familiarity 

 with his craft, meaning both wood-craft 

 and water-craft ; and this embodiment 

 of forest life is fickle, and decidedly 



