and the road we travelled was
moist, and in some places very heavy for our waggon. Several times the
latter got stalled in the mud, and then the whole party were obliged to
dismount, and put their shoulders to the wheel. Our progress was marked
by some noise and confusion, and the constant din made by Jake talking
to his team, his loud sonorous "woha!" as they were obliged to halt, and
the lively "gee-up--gee-up" as they moved on again--frighted any game
long before we could come up with it. Of course we were compelled to
keep by the waggon until we had made the passage of the miry flat.

We were dreadfully annoyed by the mosquitoes, particularly the doctor,
of whose blood they seemed to be especially fond! This is a curious
fact in relation to the mosquitoes--of two persons sleeping in the same
apartment, one will sometimes be bitten or rather punctured, and half
bled to death, while the other remains untouched! Is it the quality of
the blood or the thickness of the skin that guides to this preference?

This point was discussed amongst us--the doctor taking the view that it
was always a sign of good blood when one was more than usually subject
to the attack of mosquitoes. He was himself an apt illustration of the
fact. This statement of course produced a general laugh, and some
remarks at the doctor's expense, on the part of the opponents of his
theory. Strange to say, old Ike was fiercely assailed by the little
blood-suckers. This seemed to be an argument against the doctor's
theory, for in the tough skinny carcass of the old trapper, the blood
could neither have been very plenteous nor delicate.

Most of us smoked as we rode along, hoping by that means to drive off
the ferocious swarm, but although tobacco smoke is disagreeable to the
mosquitoes, they cannot be wholly got rid of by a pipe or cigar. Could
one keep a constant _nimbus_ of the smoke around his face it might be
effective, but not otherwise. A sufficient quantity of tobacco smoke
will kill mosquitoes outright, as I have more than once proved by a
thorough fumigation of my sleeping apartment.

These insects are not peculiar, as sometimes supposed, to the
inter-tropical regions of America. They are found in great numbers even
to the shores of the Arctic Sea, and as fierce and bloodthirsty as
anywhere else--of course only in the summer season, when, as before
remarked, the thermometer in these Northern latitudes mounts to a high
figure. Their