The Yale expositor., 1900-08-03

EIRST NATIONAL BANK,

was proposed that we tie our boat to &
boulder nearby, take off our pants and
wade over. No sooner said than done
With pants aloft in one hand, pole anC
tackle in the other, we started to wade
And as luck would have it, one of our
| lines II won't say whose) was trailing
far out in the rear; when 10 and behold
nibble and bite, and q fish was III
evidence. In the excitement of the mo-
ment every thing but that fish was for
gotten; pants and shoes were left to
care for themselves, and away they
went down stream. The current was
very swift, and before the boat was
reached the dry-goods had drifted far
out to sea. 1t cost good deal of anxi-
iety and half hours rowing before
they were captured. But this was not
the worst of it. The anxiety quickly
merged into business of a very active
nature. The mosquitoes being very nu-
merous, very large, and very hungry,
made it quite necessary to get inside
those pants before they were dry
enough to iron or crease.
Like other days, this came TO an
end, and after a good nights rest at
headquarters, another party was made
up for trip across the bay to Visa
Wasa. This is an Indian name; but
the Indians who christened it are all
now in the happy hunting grounds,
and nothing is left but the name to tell
they were once lords of the soil.
1t is picturesque little place, on the
south shore of the bay, three miles ac-
cross at this point. One of Ontario's
lumber kings has plant here employ
ing 20 to 100 men loading logs into cars
that take them across the country six
miles, where they are dumped into the
lake and started on their way to their
destination by water to Ottawa.
There is very beautiful fall here, or
rather several of them. The waters of
the Visa Wasa river come tumbling
down depth of twenty-five feet over
long bed of broken rocks, and after a
quiet sweep around the bend of the
river, take another tumble of about the
same distance, into the lake below.
But the objective point of the day
was visit to an old Canadian river
driver, named Mike O'Toole, charac-
ter, and one of the old school, He has
farm out among the hills about one
and half miles from the landing; has
snug little log house, few patches
of clearing between the rocks, wife
and two buXom daughters, and is doing
well, he says.
Being distantly related to some of
the party, insured hearty welcome to
every member. We had dinner, and a
good one, and then went berrying. 1t
was pretty hard Job for me to entire
ly ignore my present self and think l
was boy again. There were rocks to
climb, briars to scratch and tear, and
an occasional sudden drop into a crew
ice in the rocks, made it quite difficult
to keep up the illusion many minutes
at time. But there were berries in
galore, and we soon had all we wanted
and returned to the cabin, where Mike
gave us good afternoons entertain
ment relating the experiences of his
log-rolling life.
After supper we struck down the hill
for the landing, where we had tied up
our boat. Somebody had been there
before us and stolen an oar-lock. Well,
here was fix. 1t was dark and we had
to get home, and the only way out of
the difficulty was to steal another one.
l won't say this was done; but we got
across all right, and are now preparing
for the Muskoka lakes, where new eX-
periences await our coming.
Yours truly,
James Brown.