FOREST AND STREAM 
91 
flights, strewing, frisking and scudding with the 
wind as they romp over the surface about us, 
and we find ourselves actually working, to make 
headway amidst it all. A brace of duck get up 
ahead of us, and then another and another, and 
like bolts from a catapult, sail over the distant 
tree tops into the darkening sky of the vast 
beyond. 
The setting sun, straight up the narrow con¬ 
fines of the canal is tinging the waters like 
molten gold as we pull out on the north bank 
and go into camp. With the fire going and the 
wood supply in for the night, Montie cleans the 
fish at the water’s edge. Steaming kettles are 
bubbling right merrily as I arrange the frying 
pan in a bed of coals and heat her up for future 
doings and dinner. 
In the lantern’s glow, the flame of the camp¬ 
fire and moon shedding her radiance over all, we 
partake of our open air repast. The wind hum¬ 
ming through the wild grape vines, arousing the 
dead leaves to a rustling accompaniment and the 
lapping waters along the banks all in harmony 
of crescendos and softest pianissimos, is an 
orchestral contribution, befitting such a banquet 
and we would be loath to change our seat at 
table with any husbandman, ruler, prince or king 
on God’s footstool. 
Later with the friendship fire sparkling 
cheerily, Montie in moving a short heavy girth 
log nearer the fire for a back-rest, discovers a 
colony of grub-worms within its former de¬ 
composed bed. He turns to his fishing tackle at 
once and shortly after, leisurely occupies him¬ 
self swinging glistening, struggling catfish out of 
the moon-lit waters to me at the fire, where I, 
with hands protected by buckskin gauntlets re¬ 
move them and rebait the hooks. Some are 'huge; 
others, but wee fellows; and for an hour this 
sport continues and no doubt could be kept up 
all night- 
We select the medium sizes only for our wants 
and return the balance to the canal. 
Delicious! Is the verdict at breakfast, as we 
partake of their toothsome flesh, fried to a dry 
flakiness, amid the sparkling dews of the breezy 
sunlit morn. 
Flannel shirts feel com’fy as we paddle off, a 
brisk breeze in our faces, sweet with the odors 
of. Autumn. At North Landing, the last draw¬ 
bridge and terminus of the canal, we learn the 
day is Sunday. Really! How forgetful of such 
matters one can become when sojourning with 
Nature, though blessed with the sanctity of sab¬ 
batical impressiveness each day that we spend 
beneath God’s blue sky and amid His 
wooded cathedral spires and moiss or | 
leaf strewn aisles. 
North Landing River we find a [ 
gradually broadening water course, 
winding between its thickly wooded 
banks. A literal forest stream, with 
its shores garnished with all the 
rustic beauties of the season. For 
from two to three miles the wood¬ 
land vista continue, when gradually 
the forest shores recede to the back¬ 
ground, giving way to shores of low 
flats and finally, wild rice and reed 
grown marsh. 
A brisk southerly wind, direct in 
our faces compels more power to 
our blade work, with practically no 
lee shores to take advantage of. 
On the North Shore We Camp. 
We plug away for miles through the marshes 
with no wee bit of hospitable beach to greet our 
view. Surely an undesirable stretch of going to 
be caught in, toward the close of day when 
looking for a camp site; but it’s a long stream 
indeed, that has no jumping off spot. 
Reaching Pungo Ferry we learn there are ex¬ 
cellent beaches a mile beyond and at early after¬ 
noon go ashore on a hard, broad, sandy beach 
shelving a pine grove about a mile north of 
Bell Acre. 
In the lee of the pines the sun is scorching 
hot, and the welcome shade of the grove is re¬ 
freshing. During our preparations for dinner, 
visitors stroll into camp and we learn of a 
lumber camp near us back in the woods, which 
we look up and at the mill pump procure a 
supply of excellent cool water. Being Sunday, 
the mill is idle, and lazily we pass the afternoon 
in company with the idle toilers, who are very 
much interested in our canoe, the first canvas 
affair they had ever seen and they term it, “A 
good little trick.” Away to the southwest, in 
the distance, they point out to us a ridge of 
deeply wooded hills, which they call the Tubs 
Tract, and contend among themselves that it is 
untouched, seldom visited and teems with bear, 
deer and smaller game- Longingly we gaze and 
hypothetically picture its solemn solitudes and 
secluded glades. 
The sun is setting, as we pack the canoe and 
paddle off, to the regret and wonder of our new 
found friends of the lumber camp. The wind is 
dying to zephyers with the declining day, the 
moon, the alluring charm of evening is decoying 
us to the beyond and Somewhere Else. 
f 
Silently we glide around the reverse bend of 
the river to the broad expanse of the stream, 
where with the last ray of sunlight, sinking be¬ 
neath the horizon, the beacon lights open their 
eyes to beam upon us through the thickening 
twilight. Later, the moon gleams o’er all and 
we float on a silver sea, margined by shadowy, 
opaque shores. 
North Landing River here broadens to miles 
in width; but we hug the shallows of the eastern 
shore and pass along, keeping the bank well in 
view and on going ashore to investigate a strip 
of sandy beach, our outfit is charged by an angry 
bull. We back off in a hurry and leave Mr. 
Durham to his respected regime. 
The progress of our voyage is uninterrupted 
until a black hump, with long dark shadow 
puzzles our eyesight considerably out in our 
immediate front; but on nearer approach we out¬ 
line a long, low pier with a shed at its outer ex¬ 
tremity. On climbing out upon the shore end, 
we are confronted by a train of electric cars, 
dusky and silent on their steel ribbons, that 
stretch away into the inky blackness of the 
forest. 
Accosted by some of the inhabitants, who 
stroll down the track on hearing our voices, we 
learn that we have reached Munden. Oh, well, 
something else is Somewhere Else, and we are 
soon off again on our quest; but not before our 
accosters have predicted all manner of dire 
calamities for our dainty little craft and its crew 
in the magnitude of the ever broadening waters 
beyond. We were unable to give them our des¬ 
tination exactly, as we did not know it our¬ 
selves and were not in any hurry to reach it. As 
their forms are swallowed up in the shadows of 
the pier astern, their voices reach us clear and 
distinct, estimating the foolhardiness of our ven¬ 
ture and closing with the final verdict: “A pair 
of fools lacking sense enough to come in out of 
the dark.” 
They had informed us that we could find good 
camping grounds on a strip of beach a little 
further on, which we could locate by an old 
cornfield that was close to the water. The opposite 
shore was distant and but faintly perceptible; 
the eastern shore which we held close aboard 
was densely wooded through tracts, inter¬ 
spersed with open rolling farm lands. We not 
only ran across one corn field bordering a strip 
of sandy beach close to the water, but at least 
twenty. 
Somewhere along this stretch of water, as we 
leisurely paddle on through the night, we pass 
from out of the jurisdiction of Vir¬ 
ginia into that of North Carolina. 
It is nearing midnight ere we decide 
to hunt up a place to spend the bal¬ 
ance of the night. The sky has be¬ 
come overcast with blotches of thin 
clouds diffused in intermingling dark 
and silvery intersections edged by 
long curving streaks of vapor, whose 
reflections tinge the waters about us 
in an undulating mass of burnished 
steel. The wind, in fitful puffs, is 
straggling in from the east and we 
are reminded of the sailor’s adage 
in doggered: 
‘^Mackerel sky and mare’s tails, 
Make lofty ships carry low sails.” 
We finally turn in on a narrow 
strip of yielding sand beneath tire lee 
Canoe Dunnage Stowed for the Night. 
P 
