They found the course down this little waterway not troublesome, and fared on down the winding stream until at length they heard the sound of running water just beyond.
“That’s the Parsnip now, no doubt,” said Alex, quietly, to his young charges. Already Moise had pushed the Mary Ann over the last remaining portion of the stream, and she was floating fair and free on the current of the second stream, not much larger than the one from which they now emerged.
“Voila!” Moise exclaimed. “She’ll been the Peace River—or what those voyageur call the Parsneep. Now, I’ll think we make fast ride, yes.”
Jesse, leaning back against his bed-roll, looked a little serious.
“Boys,” said he, “I don’t like the looks of this. This water sounds dangerous to me, and you can’t tell me but what these mountains are pretty steep.”
“Pshaw! It’s just a little creek,” scoffed John.
“That’s all right, but a little creek gets to be a big river mighty fast up in this country—we’ve seen them up in Alaska many a time. Look at the snow-fields back in those mountains!”
“Don’t be alarmed, Mr. Jess,” said Alex; “most of the snow has gone down in the June rise. The water is about as low now as it is at any time of the year. Now, if we were here on high water, as Simon Fraser was, and going the other way, we might have our own troubles—I expect he found all this country under water where we are now, and the current must have been something pretty stiff to climb against.”
“In any case,” Rob added, “we’re just in the same shape that Sir Alexander and old Simon were when they were here. We wouldn’t care to turn back, and we’ve got to go through. If they did it, so can we. I don’t believe this stream’s as bad, anyhow, as the Fraser or the Columbia, because the traders must have used it for a regular route long ago.”