Bowdoin Boys in Labrador Part 3

[Puffins and Auks] Sat.u.r.day, the 22d of August, having yet three days before we were due at Rigolette to meet our Grand River party, we made memorable in the annals of the puffins and auks of the Heron Islands by spending three or four hours there and taking aboard three hundred and seventy-eight of them. Many more of them were killed but dropped into inaccessible places or into the water and could not be saved.

The sound of the fusilade from over twenty gunners must have resembled a small battle, but it did not drive the birds away, and as we left they seemed thicker than ever. Not only was the air alive with them, but as one walked along the cliffs they would dart swiftly out of holes in the rocks or crevices, so the earth, too, seemed full of them. It was great sport for a time, but soon seemed too much like slaughter, and we would let the awkward puffins, with their foolish eyes and Roman noses, come blundering along within a few feet of our muzzles, and chose rather the graceful, swift motioned auks and guillemots, whose rapid flight made them far more sportsmanlike game.

The next day, though Sunday, had to be spent in taking care of the best specimens, and the game was not fully disposed of for several days. Our bill of fare was correspondingly improved for a few days.

Three days were consumed in beating up to Rigolette. At Indian Harbor we had heard rumors of the return of some party from Grand River on account of injuries received by one of the men, but the description applied best to the second party, and we decided it must refer to Bryant or Kenaston. Near Turner's Cove we found more rumors, but nothing definite enough to satisfy our growing anxiety, and at last, unable to bear the suspense any longer, three of the party took a boat and started to row the fifteen miles between us and Rigolette, while the vessel waited for a change of tide and a breeze.

Alternate hope and fear lent strength to our arms as we drove the light boat along, and soon we came in sight of the wharf. There we saw a ragged looking individual, smoking a very short and black clay pipe, with one arm in a sling, who seemed to recognize us, and waved his hat vigorously with his well arm. Soon we recognized Young and were pumping away at his well hand in our delight at finding his injuries no worse, and that Cary and Cole were yet pus.h.i.+ng on, determined to accomplish their object.

Young's hand had been in a critical state; the slight injury first received unconsciously, from exposure and lack of attention had caused a swelling of his hand and arm that was both extremely painful and dangerous, and which, the doctor said, would have caused the loss of the thumb, or possibly of the whole hand, had it gone uncared for much longer. Of course it was impossible to leave a man in such a condition, or to send him back alone. So Smith very regretfully volunteered to turn back--at a point where a few days more were expected to give a sight of the Falls, and when all thought the hardest work of the Grand River party had been accomplished--and accompany Young back to Rigolette.

It was a great sacrifice of Smith's personal desires, to be one of the re-discoverers of the falls, to the interests of the expedition, and it involved a great deal of hard work, for, after paddling and rowing all day, he had to build and break camp every night and morning, as Young's hand grew steadily worse and was all he could attend to. At the mouth of the river, which was reached in shorter time than was expected, and without accident, Young obtained some relief from applications of spruce gum to his hand by Joe Michelini, a trapper and hunter, famous for his skill in all Labrador. Northwest River was reached the following day, and after a few days of rest for Smith, during which time Young's injury began to mend also under the influences of rest and shelter, they hired a small schooner boat to take them to Rigolette. On the pa.s.sage they were struck by a squall in the night, nearly swamped, and compelled to cut the Rushton boat adrift in order to save themselves. The next day they searched the leeward sh.o.r.e of the lake in vain, and had to go on without her, arriving at Rigolette without further accident, and had been there about a week when we arrived. The boat was picked up later in a badly damaged condition, and given to the finder.

While Young outlined his experience we hunted up Smith, who had been making himself useful as a clerk to the factor at the Post, Mr. Bell, and all went on board the Julia as soon as she arrived, to report and relieve in a measure the anxiety of the professor and the boys.

[Anxious waiting] The day appointed for meeting the river party was the day on which we reached Rigolette, August 25th, and so a sharp lookout was kept for the two remaining members of the party, on whom, now, the failure or success of that part of the expedition rested. As they did not appear, we moved up to a cove near Eskimo Island, at the eastern end of Lake Melville, the following day, and there spent four days of anxious waiting. Some dredging and geological work was done, and an attempt was made to examine more carefully the remains of the Eskimo village before referred to on Eskimo Island, which some investigators had thought the remains of a Norse settlement. The turf was too tough to break through without a plow, and we had to give it up, doing just enough to satisfy ourselves that the remains were purely Eskimo.

All the work attempted was done in a half-hearted manner, for our thoughts were with Cary and Cole, and as the days went by and they did not appear, but were more and more overdue, our suspense became almost unbearable. Added to this was the thought that we could wait but a few days more at the longest, without running the danger of being imprisoned all winter, and for that we were poorly prepared.

The first day of September we moved back to Rigolette to get supplies and make preparations for our voyage home, as it was positively unsafe to remain any longer. The Gulf of St. Lawrence is an ugly place to cross at any time in September, for in that month the chances are rather against a small vessel's getting across safely.

It was decided that the expedition must start home on Wednesday, the 2nd, and that a relief party should be left for Cary and Cole. With heavy hearts the final preparations were made, and many were the looks cast at the narrows where they would be seen, were they to heave in sight.

At last, about 3.30 p.m. Tuesday, the lookout yelled, "Sail ho! in the narrows," and we all jumped for the rigging. They had come, almost at the last hour of our waiting, and with a feeling of relief such as we shall seldom again experience we welcomed them aboard and heard their story.

ON BOARD THE JULIA A. DECKER, GUT OF CANSO.

Bowdoin pluck has overcome Bowdoin luck, and though they literally had to pa.s.s through fire and water, the Bowdoin men, from the Bowdoin College Scientific Expedition to Labrador have done what Oxford failed to do, and what was declared well nigh impossible by those best acquainted with the circ.u.mstances and presumably best judges of the matter. Austin Cary and Dennis Cole, Bowdoin '87 and '88, respectively, have proven themselves worthy to be ranked as explorers, and have demonstrated anew that energy and endurance are not wanting in college graduates of this generation.

A trip up a large and swift river, totally unknown to maps in its upper portions, for three hundred miles, equal to the distance from Brunswick, Me., to New York City, in open fifteen feet boats, is of itself an achievement worthy of remark. But when to this is added the discovery of Bowdoin Canon, one of the most remarkable features of North America, the settlement of the mystery of the Grand Falls, and the bringing to light of a navigable waterway extending for an unbroken ninety miles, and three hundred miles in the interior of an hitherto unknown country, something more than remark is merited.

July 26th the schooner hove to about four miles from the mouth of the Grand River, the shoals rendering a nearer approach dangerous, and the boats of the river detachment were sent over the side, taken in tow by the yawl, and the start made on what proved the most eventful part of the Labrador expedition. Cheers and good wishes followed the three boats till out of hearing, and then the Julia gathered way and headed for North West River, while the party in the yawl with the two Rushtons in tow put forth their best efforts to reach the mouth of the river and a lee before the approaching squall should strike them.

The squall came first, and as it blew heavily directly out of the river, we could simply lay to and wait for it to blow over. Then a calm followed and by the time the next squall struck we were in a comparative lee. After the heaviest of it had pa.s.sed, the Grand River boys clambered into their boats and with a hearty "good by" pulled away for the opening close at hand. The yawl meantime had grounded on one of the shoals, but pus.h.i.+ng off and carefully dodging the boulders that dot those shallow waters, she squared away for North West River, following around the sh.o.r.e, and with the aid of a fresh breeze reached the schooner shortly after 10 o'clock P.M.

[Grand River] The river party was made up of Austin Cary in charge, and W.R. Smith, '90, occupying one boat, and Dennis Cole and E.B.

Young, '92, with the other, all strong, rugged fellows, more or less acquainted with boating in rapid water, and well equipped for all emergencies. Their outfit included provisions for five weeks, flour, meal, buckwheat flour, rice, coffee, tea, sugar, beef extract, tins of pea soup, beef tongue, and preserves. They were provided with revolvers, a shot gun and a rifle, and sufficient ammunition, intending to eke out the stores with whatever game came in their way, although the amount of time given them would not allow much hunting.

All the supplies, including the surveying, measuring and meteorological instruments, were either in tins or in water-tight wrappings, while the bedding and clothing were protected by rubber blankets. The boats, made by Rushton, the Adirondack boat-builder, were of cedar, fifteen feet long, five feet wide, double-ended, and weighed eighty pounds apiece. A short deck at each end of the boats covered copper air-tanks, which made life-boats of them and added much to their safety. Each boat was equipped with a pair of oars, a paddle and about one hundred feet of small line for tracking purposes.

Proceeding about three miles the first camp was made on the south sh.o.r.e of Goose Bay, amid an abundance of mosquitoes. The next day twenty-five miles were made through shoals that nearly close the river's mouth, leaving but one good channel through which the water flows very swiftly, by the house of Joe Michelin, the trapper, at which six weeks later two very gaunt and much used up men were most hospitably received. Here another night was spent almost without sleep, owing to the mosquitoes.

Tuesday a large Indian camp was pa.s.sed, the big "pool," at the foot of the first falls and some three miles long, rowed across, and at noon the carry was begun. It was necessary to make seventeen trips and four and one half hours were used in the task. When the last load had been deposited at the upper end of the carry, the men threw themselves down on the bank utterly weary, and owing to the loss of sleep the two previous nights, were soon all sound asleep. In consequence camp was made here, and the first comfortable night of the trip pa.s.sed.

Including the carry eight miles was the day's advance.

The twenty-five miles of the next day were made rowing and tracking up the Porcupine rapids through a series of small lakes, one with a little island in the centre deceiving our boys for awhile into thinking they had reached Gull Island Lake, and then up another short rapid at the head of which the party encamped.

Sixteen miles were made next day by alternate rowing and tracking, the foot of Gull Island Lake was reached, and after dinner it was crossed in one and a half hours. Then the heaviest work of the trip thus far was struck and camp was made, about half way up Gull Lake rapid.

Supper was made off a goose shot the previous day. It was necessary to double the crews in getting up the latter part of Gull Island rapids, and finally a short carry was made just at noon to get clear of them.

From the fact that the light, beautifully modelled boats required four men to take them up the rapids we may get some idea of the swiftness of the river as well as the difficulties attending the mode of travelling. As the river in its swiftest parts is never less than half a mile wide, and averages a mile, it can readily be seen that it is a grand waterway, well deserving its name.

Nine miles were made this day and camp was reached at the beginning of rough water on the Horse Shoe Rapid. Here the first evidence of shoes giving out was seen. Constant use over rough rocks while wet proved too much for even the strongest shoes, and when Cary and Cole returned there was not leather enough between them to make one decent shoe.

Rain made the night uncomfortable, as the light shelter tent let the water through very easily and was then of little use. At other times the tents were very comfortable. Upon arriving at the spot selected two men would at once set about preparing the brush for beds, pitching the tent, etc., while the other provided wood for the camp and for the cook, in which capacity Cary officiated. I cannot do better than use Cary's own words in reference to his "humble but essential ministrations." "Camp cooking at best is rather a wearing process, but the agonies of a man whose hands are tangled up in dough and whom the flies becloud, competing for standing room on every exposed portion of his body, can be imagined only by the experienced."

The party believed that a good night's rest was indispensible where the day was filled with the hardest kind of labor, and spared no pains to secure them. Even on the return Cary and Cole, when half starved, stuck to their practice of making comfortable camps, and it is probable that the wonderful way they held out under their privations was largely due to this. While many in their predicament would have thrown away their blankets, they kept them, and on every cold and stormy night congratulated themselves that they had done so.

[Loss of boat] On Sat.u.r.day, Aug. 1st, the first accident happened.

Tracking on the Horse Shoe Rapids was extremely difficult and dangerous. Shortly after dinner a carry was made, taking three and a half hours to track out a path up and along a terrace about fifty feet high. Shortly after this the boat used by Cary and Smith capsized, emptying its load into the river. The party were "tracking" at the time, Cole being nearly the length of the tow line ahead, tugging on it, while Cary was doing his best to keep the boat off the rocks. At the margin of the swift unbroken current there were strong eddies, and in hauling the boat around a bend her bow was pushed into one, her slight keel momentarily preventing her from heading up stream again, and the rush of the water bore her under. At the same time Cary was carried from his footing and just managed to grasp the line as he came up and escape being borne down the stream. When things were collected and an inventory taken of the loss, it was found to include about one-fourth of the provisions, the barometer and chronometer rendered useless and practically lost, measuring chain, cooking utensils, rifles with much of the ammunition, axe and small stores, such as salt, sugar, coffee, etc. The loss was a severe one, and arose from failure to fasten the stores into the boats before starting, as had been ordered. The time given the party for the trip was so short, the distance so uncertain, and the things they desired to have an opportunity to do on the return that would require comparative leisure were so many, that they begrudged the few minutes necessary to properly lash the loads into the boats, each time they broke camp; and delay and disaster were the results. As the day was nearly spent, camp was made but about a mile from the last, and time used in repairing damages. A very ingenious baker for bread was contrived by Cole from an empty flour tin, a new paddle made to replace the one lost, and a redistribution of the baggage remaining effected.

In the following five days sixty-six miles were made with a few short carries, some rowing and a good deal of hard tracking. Having pa.s.sed the Mininipi river and rapids, the latter being the worst on the river, the bank furnis.h.i.+ng almost no foothold for tracking the Mauni rapids were reached and finally at 5 P.M., Aug. 6th, the party emerged into Lake Waminikapo. As Cary's journal puts it, here the party "first indulged in hilarity." The hardest part of the work was over and had been done in much less time than had been expected. According to all accounts the falls should be found only thirty miles beyond the head of the lake, which is forty miles long and good rowing water, and about three weeks time yet remained before they were due at Rigolette.

Added to this a perfect summer afternoon, comparatively smooth water, running around the base of a magnificent cliff and opening out through a gorge with precipitous sides, showing a beautiful vista of lake and mountain, with the knowledge of rapids behind and the object of the trip but a short way ahead and easy travelling most of that way, and we may readily understand why these tired and travel worn voyagers felt hilarious. Cary says of the scene: "As we gradually worked out of the swift water the terraces of sand and stones were seen to give way and the ridges beyond to approach one another and to erect themselves, until at the lake's mouth we entered a grand portal between cliffs on either hand towering for hundreds of feet straight into the air. And looking beyond and between the reaches of the lake was seen a ribbon of water lying between steep sided ridges, over the face of which, as we pulled along, mountain streams came pouring."

One day was used in making the length of the lake, and at the camp at its head Young and Smith turned back. A very badly swelled hand and arm caused by jamming his thumb had prevented Young from getting any sleep and threatened speedily to become worse. This in connection with the loss of provisions in the upset made it expedient to send the two men back. The returning party was given the best boat, the best of the outfit and provisions for six days, in which time they could easily reach the mouth of the river. Meantime Cary and Cole pushed on into what was to prove the most eventful part of their journey.

The lake is simply the river valley with the terraces cleaned out, and was probably made when the river was much higher, at a time not far removed from the glacial period. The head of the lake is full of sand bars and shoals, much resembling the mouth of the river as it opens out into Goose bay. On both sides of the lake mountains rise steeply for one thousand or twelve hundred feet. Its average width is from two to three miles and it has three long bends or curves. Only one deep valley breaks the precipitous sides, but many streams flow in over the ridge, making beautiful waterfalls.

The river as it enters the lake is about half a mile wide, but soon increases to a mile. Twenty miles were made by the advance the day the parties separated, and at night, almost at the place where the falls were reported, nothing but smooth water could be seen for a long stretch ahead. Sunday, the 9th, twenty-five miles were made the good rowing continuing, by burnt lands, and banks over which many cascades tumbled. Monday, the last day's advance in the boats was made, the water becoming too swift to be stemmed, This day Cary got the second ducking of the trip--a very good record in view of the roughness of the work and the smallness of the boats. During this and the day previous an otter, a crow and a robin were seen. As a rule the river was almost entirely deserted by animal life.

[Mount Hyde] The next day the boat and the provisions, excepting a six days supply carried in the packs, were carefully cached, and at 10:45 camp was left and the memorable tramp begun. Each man carried about twenty-five pounds. The stream was followed a short distance, then the abrupt ascent to the plateau climbed, old river beaches being found all the way up. Ascending a birch knoll, the river was in view for quite a long distance and a large branch seen making in from the west.

To the north the highest mountain, in fact the only peak in the vicinity, was seen towering up above the level plateau. Towards this peak, christened Mt. Hyde, the party tramped, and arriving at the top saw the country around spread out like a map. Way off towards the northwest a large lake was seen from which Grand River probably flows, and nearer was a chain of small, shallow and rocky ponds. The country is rocky, covered with deep moss and fairly well wooded, with little underbrush. The wood is all spruce save in the river valleys where considerable birch is mixed in. The black flies were present in clouds, even in the strong wind blowing at the top of Mt. Hyde, and made halt for rest or any stop whatever intolerable. Leaving the mountain, after taking bearings of all the points to be seen, the party struck for the river and camped on the bank between the two branches coming in from the westward, several miles apart. The following day, with faces much swollen from fly bites of the day before, the line of march was along the banks till 2 P.M. when the upper fork was reached.

The course of the river is southeast. This branch course is from the northwest. The main stream turns off sharply to the northeast and after a few miles pa.s.ses into a deep canon, christened "Bowdoin Canon," between precipitous walls of archeac rock from six hundred to eight hundred feet high. This canon was afterward found to be about twenty-five miles long and winding in its course. In but few places is the slope such as to permit a descent to the river bank proper, and the canon is so narrow, and the walls of such perpendicular character, as to make the river invisible from a short distance. It might truly be said that the discovery of this canon, infinitely grander on account of its age than any other known to geology, and surpa.s.sed by few in size, is the most important result of the expedition. Several photographs of it were made, which were not injured by the exposure to wet and rough usage that the camera had to receive during the return journey, and alone convey an adequate idea of this most wonderful of nature's wonders.

At night the first camp away from the river was made, on the plateau.

The two men felt that the next day must be their last of advance, so weakened were they by the terrible tramping over deep moss and the persistent bleeding by black flies. The stock of provisions, too, was running low, and with their diminis.h.i.+ng strength was a warning to turn back that could not be neglected. A half dozen grouse, three Canada and three rough, had been added to their supplies, but even with full meals they could not long stand the double drain upon their strength.

In the morning a high hill was seen, for which they started, drawing slightly away from the river. Soon a roar from the direction of the river was noticed, which differed from the ordinary roar of the rapids. Altering their course it was found the roar "kept away,"

indicating an unusually heavy sound. Pus.h.i.+ng forward, thinking it must be the desired falls, they soon came out upon the river bank, with the water at their level. This proved the falls to be below them, and looking down they could be seen "smoking" about a mile distant. A distinct pounding had also been felt for some time previous, which further a.s.sured them that the falls were at hand. The roar that had attracted their attention was of the river running at the plateau level. At the point they came out upon it, it was nearly two hundred yards wide, a heavy boiling rapid. Walking down the great blocks of rock which form the sh.o.r.e, the river appeared to narrow and at 11.45 A.M., the Grand Falls were first seen.

[The marked Bowdoin Spruce] After making pictures of the Falls a feeling of reaction manifested itself in Cary's physical condition, and he remarked, "I do not wish to go farther, I need sleep." Cole, as a.s.sistant, had avoided the wear and anxiety of leaders.h.i.+p. His athletic work at Bowdoin, in throwing the shot and hammer and running on the Topsham track, had given him stored energy of arm and leg. This reserve strength prompted him to press forward and see more of a region new to human eyes. Leaving his hatchet with Cary, now rolled up in his blanket, with the hope and expectation that on waking he would use the same in preparing fuel and cooking supper, Cole pressed forward into the strange and unknown country three or four miles, and then, for a final view of the location, climbed the highest tree he could find and from its top surveyed the waste of land and river. He stood thus exalted near the center of the vast peninsula of Labrador.

Four hundred and fifty miles to the east lay the wide expanse of Hamilton Inlet. Four hundred and fifty miles to the north lay Cape Chudleigh, towards which he could imagine the Julia A. Decker, vainly as it proved, pointing her figure head through fog and ice. Only six hundred miles due south the granite chapel of Bowdoin College points heavenward both its uplifted hands. Four hundred and fifty miles to the west rolled the waves of that great inland ocean, Hudson's Bay, into whose depths, Henry Hudson, after his penetrations to northern waters above Spitzbergen, after his pus.h.i.+ng along the eastern coast of Greenland, after his magnificent and successful exploration of the American coast from Maine to Virginia, penetrating Delaware bay and river and sailing up that river crowned by the Palisades and the hights of the Catskills, honored with his name and whose waters bear the largest portion of the commercial wealth of our own country; still fascinated by the vision of a northwest pa.s.sage that intrepid explorer penetrated into the waters of the unknown sea whose waves unseen dash along the coasts of Labrador from its westward to its northern sh.o.r.es and Cape Chudleigh. All these explorations he accomplished in a sailing vessel about the size of the Julia A. Decker, the s.h.i.+p "Discoverie" of seventy tons. He had wintered at the southern extremity of Hudson's Bay surrounded by a mutinous crew. In the hards.h.i.+ps and suffering of the next season, after he had divided his last bread with his men, in the summer of 1611, while near the western coast of Labrador, half way back to the Straits, by an ungrateful crew he was thrust into a sail boat with his son John and five sailors sick and blind with scurvy, and was left to perish in the great waste of waters, which, bearing his name, is "his tomb and his monument." Cole, with his mind and imagination filled with these facts, involuntarily took his knife and carved his name and the expedition on the upper part of the tree which formed his outlook. It might be his monument as the Inland Sea was that of Hudson. Then to have the tree marked and observable to other eyes, in case other eyes should see that country, he commenced to cut the branches from near the top of the tall spruce.

He regretted much the leaving of the hatchet with Cary as he was obliged to do the work with his knife. It was a slow and laborious job. His imagination, as it roamed over the wide land, and his interest in his present efforts, had consumed time faster than he knew, and the slanting rays of the western sun started him with thoughts of Cary and supper. It was dark when he reached Cary and he was still asleep. The hatchet was idle, and he wished more than ever that his efforts on the branches of the marked Bowdoin Spruce had been rendered less laborious and more expeditious by the aid of this, to be hereafter his constant companion and source of safety along with another and more diminutive friend, a pocket pistol.

[Grand Falls] The falls proper are three hundred and sixteen feet high, and just above the river narrows from two hundred and fifty to fifty yards, the water shooting over a somewhat gradual downward course and then plunging straight down with terrific force the distance mentioned, and with an immense volume. The river is much higher at times and the fall must be even grander, for while the party was there the ground quaked with the shock of the descending stream, and the river was nearly at its lowest point. At the bottom is a large pool made by the change of direction of the river from south at and above the falls to nearly east below. The canon begins at the pool and extends as has been described, with many turns and windings, for twenty-five miles through archaic rock. Above the falls in the wide rapids, the bed was of the same rock, which seems to underlie the whole plateau. In 1839, the falls were first seen by a white man, John McLean, an officer of the Hudson Day Co., while on an exploring expedition in that "great and terrible wilderness" known as Labrador.

His description is very general, but he was greatly impressed with the stupendous height of the falls, and terms it one of the grandest spectacles of the world. Twenty years later, one Kennedy, also an employe of the Hudson Bay Co., persuaded an Iroquois Indian, who did not share the superst.i.tious dread of them common among the Labrador Indians, to guide him to the thundering fall and misty chasm. He left no account of his visit, however, and in fact, though one other man reached them, and Mr. Holmes, an Englishman, made the attempt and failed, no full account of the falls has been given to the world, until Cary and Cole made their report. Above the falls as far as could be seen, all was white water, indicating a fall of about one hundred foot per mile. In the course of twenty-five or thirty miles there is a descent of twelve hundred feet, nearly equal to the alt.i.tude of the "Height of Land," as the interior plateau of Labrador is called, which has probably been previously overestimated. The next forenoon was spent in surveying and making what measurements could be made in the absence of the instruments lost in the upset. At noon, after having spent just twenty-four hours at Grand Falls, the party turned back.

The very fact of having succeeded, made distance shorter and fatigue more easily borne, so they travelled along at a rattling pace, surveying at times and little thinking of the disaster that had befallen them. Camp was made on the river bank, beneath one of the terraces which lined both sides.

Sat.u.r.day Aug. 15th, the march back to the boat cache was resumed.

Towards night, as they approached the place, smoke was seen rising from the ground, and fearing evil, the men broke into a run during the last two miles. As Cary's journal puts it: "We arrived at our camp to find boat and stores burnt and the fire still smoking and spreading.

Cole arrives first, and as I come thras.h.i.+ng through the bushes he sits on a rock munching some burnt flour. He announces with an unsteady voice: 'Well, she's gone.' We say not much, nothing that indicates poor courage, but go about to find what we can in the wreck, and pack up for a tramp down river. In an hour we have picked out everything useful, including my money, nails, thread and damaged provisions, and are on the way down river hoping to pa.s.s the rapids before dark, starting at 5."

Their position was certainly disheartening. They were one hundred and fifty miles from their nearest cache, and nearly three hundred from the nearest settlement, already greatly used up, needing rest and plenty of food; in a country that forbade any extended tramping inland to cut off corners, on a river in most places either too rough for a raft or with too sluggish a current to make rafting pay; and above all, left with a stock of food comprising one quart of good rice, brought back with them, three quarts of mixed meal, burnt flour and burnt rice, a little tea, one can of badly dried tongue, and one can of baked beans that were really improved by the fire. Add to this some three dozen matches and twenty-five cartridges, blankets and what things they had on the tramp to the falls, and the list of their outfit, with which to cover the three hundred miles, is complete.

There was no time to be wasted, and that same night six miles were made before camping. The next day the battle for life began. It was decided that any game or other supplies found on the way should be used liberally, while those with which they started were husbanded.

This day several trout were caught, line and hooks being part of each man's outfit, and two square meals enjoyed, which proved the last for a week. A raft was made that would not float the men and baggage, and being somewhat discouraged on the subject of rafting by the failure, another was not then attempted, and the men continued tramping.

Following the river, they found its general course between the rapids and Lake Wanimikapo, S.S.E. During part of that day and all the next, they followed in the track of a large panther, but did not get in sight of him. Acting on the principle that they should save their strength as much as possible, camps were gone into fairly early and were well made; and this night, in spite of the desperate straits they were in, both men enjoyed a most delightful sleep.