"Feel! I feel as if I could run a thousand miles and jump off the ends of the earth—"
"And dive to the bottom of the sea and harness whales and play bowling-balls with the spheres, you young rantipoles," added M. Radisson ironically.
"The fever of the adventurer," said Jean quietly. "My uncle knows it."
I laughed again. "I was wondering if Eli Kirke ever felt this way," I explained.
"Pardieu," retorted M. de Radisson, loosening his coat, "if people moved more and moped less, they'd brew small bile! Come, lads! Come, lads! We waste time!"
And we were paddling again, in quick, light strokes, silent from zest, careless of toil, strenuous from love of it.
Once we came to a bend in the river where the current was so strong that we had dipped our paddles full five minutes against the mill race without gaining an inch. The canoe squirmed like a hunter balking a hedge, and Jean's blade splintered off to the handle. But M. de Radisson braced back to lighten the bow; the prow rose, a sweep of the paddles, and on we sped!
"Hard luck to pull and not gain a boat length," observed Jean.
"Harder luck not to pull, and to be swept back," corrected M. de Radisson.
We left the main river to thread a labyrinthine chain of waterways, where were portages over brambly shores and slippery rocks, with the pace set at a run by M. de Radisson. Jean and I followed with the pack straps across our foreheads and the provisions on our backs. Godefroy brought up the rear with the bark canoe above his head.