“Yes, and fresh, too.”
“If Jack saw this he would go wild,” said Rose. “And the little marks?”
“Them’s cubs. They’ve been roun’ here a sight.”
As they went on, the hills became higher and more steep. At their bases lay the wreckage of countless years, the work of ice and heat and storms piled high along the shores. It was covered with dense greenery of beech and birch and poplar. Out of this, in darker masses, broad columns of tamarack, pine, and spruce seemed to be climbing the long upper slopes of the hills which, still higher, lifted gray granite summits, free of growths.
“How fast do we go?” said Rose.
“It is good poling on this stream to make three miles an hour. On the St. Anne there is one ten-mile stretch which takes all day. Watch the movement of using the poles. See how graceful it is,—the strong push, the change of hands, the recovery. Ah!—” Suddenly the bowman let go his pole, which Tom seized as it came to the stern.
“Now, that’s a good thing to see, Rose. He caught it in the rocks, and let it go. If he held it, it would break, or he go over, and possibly upset us,—no trifle in these wild waters. It requires instant decision.”
“I see. Aren’t these the clearings?”
“Yes.”
And now, on the farther side, the hills fell away, and the stream grew broad and less swift. A wide alluvial space, dotted with elms, lay to the left, with here and there the half-hidden smoke of a log-house.