105 
1923 
[arch 
luckier ana in tne course or tne lew 
hours’ paddle encountered two of his only 
slightly less regal subjects. In one of 
the lakes, while yet some distance off, 
md 
the 
of 
few 
: the further one penetrates the thicker 
nd denser becomes the forest- growth 
bank. He swam rapidly, his head, sport¬ 
ing a fine set of antlers, erect in the 
water. With a single leap he was up 
the bank, and in another had been com¬ 
pletely swallowed up by the woods. 
! lid the few and more distantly separated 
lire the settlements with cultivated lands 
ibout them. Impenetrable brush borders 
he roadside and one is into the Nova 
*§icotia wilderness—a magnificent wilder¬ 
ness of untold acres of tall and stately 
pruce and fir, of graceful hemlock, 
turdy oak, and flaming maple. 
At Milford Lake we reached the first 
irge body of water, and which is the 
Untrance to some of the continent's best 
noose country. Each year it is the 
maunt of countless hunters and nature 
rovers who go there from all distances 
nd have been doing so year after year, 
-lever surfeited with the primitive 
grandeur of the region. It is the first 
jif the Liverpool chain of lakes which, 
finked up by the Mersey river, reach 
through fifty superb bodies of water of 
arying expanse to the Atlantic ocean, 
lere we outfitted ourselves with canoe, 
ent, cooking apparatus and grub, and 
ilaced ourselves unreservedly in the 
fiiands of a guide whose reputation for 
voodcraft is international and who, we 
vere told, would produce a moose if any 
nerc human being could. 
r HE ten-mile paddle down to the 
moose grounds will be a memory for 
nany years, for, in the almost instan- 
aneous transfer from the bustling and 
ordid atmosphere of a large city, the 
omance of the quest overwhelmed us, the 
itter silence closed about us oppressively, 
he vast primitive beauty seemed beyond 
unite conception. Out of one lake into 
Another the canoe glided, expertly 
;uided, past boulders which impeded 
he way in the connecting waters. I he 
(arrows connecting the lakes were con- 
rastingly spots of 
, r entle calm where 
h e 11 e r e d trees 
Irooped gracefully 
iver the motion - 
ess water. The 
I orest on either 
ide was dense 
nd impenetrable 
o the eye, but was 
! ^ay with all the 
] ints o f nature. 
I ’flaming clumps of 
naplcs i n their 
. u t u m n a 1 garb 
jiuickly arrested 
i he attention ; 
>irch and hemlock 
; eaves were tuni¬ 
ng brown; the oak 
i a d assumed a 
nore sombre hue; 
>nly the pines and 
pruce maintained 
I heir green coats 
untarnished. I n 
he narrows dead 
eaves dropped rustling into the canoe, 
j ir floated idly away on the water. It 
i vas a picture all the artists’ brushes in 
he world could but inadequately depict, 
j All the wilderness brooded in peace. 
We had started out in the hope 
, 3f seeing a moose but were even 
Within the same hour we espied a 
brother of his also finding the same 
shore more desirable and though we ob¬ 
served him for some considerable time 
he is ignorant to this day of having 
been so close to the humankind or the 
imminent peril he might have been in. 
The wind was blowing from the swim¬ 
mer towards us and it was possible to 
paddle the canoe up so close that his 
every movement could be observed. 
The bank confronting him was steep 
and he swam back and forth for some 
time before he found a convenient spot 
at which to emerge. He finally gained 
a footing, clambered out with some diffi¬ 
culty and stood for fully a minute upon 
the bank, broadside on, in our uninter¬ 
rupted view. The veriest tyro with a 
rifle could scarcely have failed to bring 
him down, but for us his beauty would 
have vanished in his slaughter. 
Ten miles’ paddling brought us about 
the middle of the afternoon to Birch 
Point where camp was made, a tent sent 
up and a roaring fire built. The situa¬ 
tion was an ideal one, at the junction of 
two large lakes and where one of them 
opened into a rounding bay known as 
Palmer’s Cove. The forest grew thick 
and dense down to the water’s edge save 
in the cove where beyond the fringe of 
the trees was an extensive area of tag 
alder on which the moose browse sum¬ 
mer and winter. The silence seemed 
heavy as a blanket. In the sheltered 
cove scarce a ripple was stirred on the 
water. Only periodically did the wind 
sough through the tall trees or some 
small creature 
cause a rustling in 
the underbrush. 
It was an atmos¬ 
phere of unutter¬ 
able peace and ex¬ 
quisite beauty, re¬ 
acting in an ex¬ 
hilaration of the 
spirit. It was in¬ 
finitely good to be 
alive. 
r "P HE sun had set 
and the eve¬ 
ning’s chill was on 
the air before the 
guide stowed his 
pipe away in his 
pocket and led us 
down to the canoe 
in which we seated 
ourselves. Silent¬ 
ly he set the craft 
out from the shore 
and made for the 
cove, seeming to 
redouble his caution to cause never a 
ripple as we approached the reeds. The 
canoe wound its way through a narrow 
channel in the alders and was still some 
distance from the shore when the 
growth impeded further progress and a 
(Continued on page 134) 
Louis Harlow calling moose 
Starting for the moose country 
the wonderfully attuned eyes of the 
guide spotted a buck white-tailed deer 
making his way from one shore to the 
other. Some strenuous work with the 
paddles brought us fairly close to him 
before we were observed and the swim¬ 
ming animal decided to make for the 
