"There could be no question now about the propriety of landing. Old Weeso took all the Indians off to a rock, where, bareheaded and in line, they kneeled facing the east, and for half an hour he led them in prayer, making often the sign of the cross. The headwind died away as they came to the boat and again we resumed the weary rowing, a labour which all were supposed to share, but it did not need an expert to see that Beaulieu, Snuff, and Terchon merely dipped their oars and let them drift a while; the real rowing of that cumbrous old failure of a sailboat was done by Billy Loutit and Yum Freesay."
CHAPTER XXV
CROSSING THE LAKE—ITS NATURAL HISTORY
All day long here, as on the Nyarling, I busied myself with compass and sketch-book, making the field notes, sketches, and compass surveys from which my various maps were compiled; and Preble let no chance go by of noting the changing bird and plant life that told us we quit the Canadian fauna at Stony Island and now were in the Hudsonian zone.
This is the belt of dwindling trees, the last or northmost zone of the forest, and the spruce trees showed everywhere that they were living a life-long battle, growing and seeding, but dwarfed by frost and hardships. But sweet are the uses of adversity, and the stunted sprucelings were beautified, not uglified, by their troubles. I never before realised that a whole country could be such a series of charming little Japanese gardens, with tiny trees, tiny flowers, tiny fruits, and gorgeous oriental rugs upon the earth and rocks between.
I photographed one group of trees to illustrate their dainty elfish dwarfishness, but realising that no one could guess the height without a scale, I took a second of the same with a small Indian sitting next it.
Weeso is a kind old soul; so far as I could see he took no part in the various seditions, but he was not an inspiring guide. One afternoon he did something that made a final wreck of my confidence. A thunderstorm was rumbling in the far east. Black clouds began travelling toward us; with a line of dark and troubled waters below, the faint breeze changed around and became a squall. Weeso looked scared and beckoned to Freesay, who came and took the helm. Nothing happened.
We were now running along the north shore of Et-then, where are to be seen the wonderful 1,200-foot cliffs described and figured by Captain George Back in 1834. They are glorious ramparts, wonderful in size and in colour, marvellous in their geological display.
Flying, and evidently nesting among the dizzy towers, were a few
Barn-swallows and Phoebe-birds.
This cliff is repeated on Oot-sing-gree-ay, the next island, but there it is not on the water's edge. It gives a wonderful echo which the Indians (not to mention myself) played with, in childish fashion.