98 
EXTBAORDINARY SOUND. 
stance that gave me uneasiness, but the men had generally 
been behaving so well that I relied a great deal upon them. 
About 3 p.m. on the 7th, Mr. Hume and I were occu- 
pied tracing the chart upon the ground. The day had 
been remarkably fine, not a cloud was there in the heavens, 
nor a breath of air to be felt. On a sudden we heard what 
seemed to be the report of a gun fired at the distance of 
between five and six miles. It was not the hollow sound of 
an earthly explosion, or the sharp cracking noise of falling 
timber, but in every way resembled a discharge of a 
heavy piece of ordnance. On this all were agreed, but no 
one was certain whence the sound proceeded. Both 
Mr. Hume and myself had been too attentive to our 
occupation to form a satisfactory opinion ; but we both 
thought it came from the N. W. I sent one of the men 
immediately up a tree, but he could observe nothing un- 
usual. The country around him appeared to be equally 
flat on all sides, and to be thickly wooded: whatever 
occasioned the report, it made a strong impression on all 
of us ; and to this day, the singularity of such a sound, 
in such a situation, is a matter of mystery to me. 
On the 8th, we commenced our journey down the river, 
accompanied by two men^ and a pack-horse, carrying our 
provisions on one side and a bucket of water on the other. 
Keeping in general near the stream, but making occasional 
turns into the plains, we got to the brush from which the 
party had turned back, about 3 p.m. Passing through, 
we crossed a small plain, of better soil and vegetation 
