170 
THE MAINE WOODS. 
miles wide at the widest place, and thirty miles long in 
a direct line, but longer as it lies. The captain of the 
steamer called it thirty-eight miles as he steered. We 
should probably go about forty. The Indian said that 
it was called “ Mspame , because large water.” Squaw 
Mountain rose darkly on our left, near the outlet of the 
Kennebec, and what the Indian called Spencer Bay Moun¬ 
tain, on the east, and already we saw Mount Kineo before 
us in the north. 
Paddling near the shore, we frequently heard the 
pe-pe of the olive-sided fly-catcher, also the wood-pewee, 
and the kingfisher, thus early in the morning. The 
Indian reminding us that he could not work without 
eating, we stopped to breakfast on the main shore, south¬ 
west of Deer Island, at a spot "where the Mimulus 
ringens grew abundantly. We took out our bags, and 
the Indian made a fire under a very large bleached log, 
using white-pine bark from a stump, though he said that 
hemlock was better, and kindling with canoe-birch bark. 
Our table was a large piece of freshly peeled birch-bark, 
laid wrong-side-up, and our breakfast consisted of hard 
bread, fried pork, and strong coffee, well sweetened, in 
which we did not miss the milk. 
While we were getting breakfast a brood of twelve 
black dippers, half grown, came paddling by within three 
or four rods, not at all alarmed; and they loitered about 
as long as we stayed, now huddled close together, within 
a circle of eighteen inches in diameter, now moving off 
in a long line, very cunningly. Yet they bore a certain 
proportion to the great Moosehead Lake on whose bosom 
they floated, and I felt as if they were under its protection. 
Looking northward from this place it appeared as if 
yve were entering a large bay, and we did not know 
