THE ALLEGASH AND EAST BRANCH. 
233 
companion, who was nodding, that he must not allow 
himself to fall asleep in the canoe lest he should upset 
us; adding, that when Indians want to sleep in a 
canoe, they lie down straight on the bottom. But in this 
crowded one that was impossible. However, he said 
that he would nudge him if he saw him nodding. 
A belt of dead trees stood all around the lake, some 
far out in the water, with others prostrate behind them, 
and they made the shore, for the most part, almost inac¬ 
cessible. This is the effect of the dam at the outlet. 
Thus the natural sandy or rocky shore, with its green 
fringe, was concealed and destroyed. We coasted west¬ 
ward along the north side, searching for the outlet, about 
one quarter of a mile distant from this savage-looking 
shore, on which the waves were breaking violently, 
knowing that it might easily be concealed amid this rub¬ 
bish, or by the over-lapping of the shore. It is remark¬ 
able how little these important gates to a lake are bla¬ 
zoned. There is no triumphal arch over the modest 
inlet or outlet, but at some undistinguished point it tric¬ 
kles in or out through the uninterrupted forest, almost as 
through a sponge. 
We reached the outlet in about an hour, and carried 
over the dam there, which is quite a solid structure, and 
about one quarter of a mile farther there was a second 
dam. The reader will perceive that the result of this 
particular damming about Chamberlain Lake is, that the 
head-waters of the St. John are made to flow by Ban¬ 
gor. They have thus dammed all the larger lakes, rais¬ 
ing their broad surfaces many feet ; Moosehead, for 
instance, some forty miles long, with its steamer on it; 
thus turning the forces of nature against herself, that they 
might float their spoils out of the country. They rapidly 
