Mr. Hubbard said, "I often have seen dogs eating bones and thought it was pretty hard lines for them, but it must be only fun for them."
Before coming to our rapid, the rapid we had always talked about where we thought we would get lots of fish, I told Mr. Hubbard and Wallace my dream I had that night. It did not seem like a dream but more like some one talking to me. When travelling this summer when we began to be out of grub, if we dreamt of having a good meal at some restaurant we often told it to each other next morning. This morning my dream was:—
A man came to me and told me, "You will get to the rapid to-day and I cannot spare you more than two or three meals of fish, and do not waste much time there. Go right on and don't leave the river, but follow the river on. It is only the way you can save your lives. Follow the river down."
We got to the rapid about noon, all feeling very, very weak. I started a fire. By the time I got some wood and had my fire started they had already enough fish for a pretty fair meal and, of course, you can imagine how glad we were and did not delay much time but got our fish for lunch. It was nice to have something to eat again. We were pretty sure of getting lots more. After lunch Mr. Hubbard and Wallace fished. It was good signs of caribou round there. I took the rifle and tracked up the caribou, but I saw nothing. It was late when I got back. The boys were still fishing. They had caught about sixty more little trout. We felt as if we could eat all those fish in one meal, but seeing they were so scarce we had to try and save some for the next day.
Saturday, October 10th.—We fished all before noon and did not get any at all. So we had to start off from there, seeing it was no use in trying to fish any more. We came to some more rapids in the afternoon. Wallace and I ran some with empty canoe, and then went back for our dunnage, while Mr. Hubbard would fish. It got very cold in the afternoon. Mr. Hubbard caught about twenty little trout. Looking forward we hoped next day to get to our old camp, Camp Caribou, where we killed our caribou August 12th. We thought that may be we will find some of the old bones so as to make some broth, thinking it would help us some. We camped just near the river where we could get lots of wood, and have a good camp fire so we could sit beside the camp fire and have a good talk about home.
Mr. Hubbard tells me he will get a room for me in New York. He again that night asked me to stay with him a couple of months in Congers before I go home to Missanabie, and also to pay him a visit real often, and also that he would never go out doing any travelling without me.
He said, "I am sure Mrs. Hubbard will not be able to do enough for you, especially when she knows how good you have been to me. I would like to have you come with me to Michigan. I am sure my sister would like to have you tell them the story about our trip."
Sunday, October llth.—Had four small trout for lunch, only little larger than a sardine. Late in the evening we came to our old camp, where we had the caribou. Most of the bones were carried off by some animals. Picked up all we could find and made some broth, and very, very strong broth too, which I suppose no one could hardly believe that any human being could eat. The bones were full of maggots, and when it boiled for some time the maggots would boil out. It just looked like if it had been little rice in it. We drunk it up maggots and all. It was pretty high, but found it good. Nothing was too bad for us to eat.
Monday, October 12th.—Fine day. In the morning we had bone broth again and tea. We started off carrying all the bones we could find in our pail, also taking the caribou horns with us. At noon we had broth and piece of the hide we got off from the caribou horns. In the evening we came to a rapid. Hubbard and I nearly swamped the canoe, and part of the rapid was too rough to run. It was only just a short lift over, about 100 feet. The three of us took the canoe, and before getting over we dropped it. We were getting so weak that it took the three of us to carry the canoe, and yet we couldn't even that distance. We looked at each other, but none complained of his weakness. We found we could not go any farther without something to eat. We ate one of Mr. Hubbard's old moccasins, made out of caribou skin, that he made himself. We boiled it in the frying pan, till it got kind of soft, and we shared in three parts. Each had his share and found it good, and also drank up the water where it was boiled in. At night we had some tea, and it freshened us up some.
Tuesday, October 13th.—Wind raw and cold. We came to a little fall we had to carry over, quite short, about 40 feet portage, but our canoe we hadn't the strength to carry. We had to drag it over the rocks.