ngs of the Mohawk and the
rivers which empty into the St. Lawrence. There was one settler on the
lake, from whom I could, when necessary, get a loaf of bread, but
the solitude for nine days out of ten was not broken by a strange
footfall. My camp was a shelter of bark, raised on poles, open in
front to the morning sun, just sufficing to shed the rain, while my
bed was a layer of the branches of the fir-trees that grew around.
Trout from the lake, broiled on the coals of the camp-fire, with a
piece of bread, was the usual and sufficient fare, though we now and
then killed a deer when Steve, my guide, was with me; at other times
the dog was my only company, and in this monotonous life I found the
most complete content that my experience has given me. Here wolves
abounded, but only on one occasion did they attempt to disturb me,
which was when I had left by the lake shore a deer we had killed in
the morning, and they came at night to steal the meat. Bears were
abundant, but even shyer than the wolves; and though we heard, now and
then, the cry of a panther (puma), we never saw one.

Here the morbid passion of solitude grew on me. The serene silence was
seldom broken save by the cry of an eagle or an osprey, high overhead,
the chirping of the chickadee flitting about the camp to find a crumb,
or the complaining note of the Canada jay, most friendly of all wild
birds, seeking for the scraps of venison we used to throw out for him.
No other birds came to us, and one of the most striking features
in the Wilderness was the paucity of bird life and voice. As I
sat painting, I would see the gray eagle come down, with his long
cycloidal swoop, skimming along the surface of the water, and catch,
as he passed, the trout that sunned itself on the surface; or the
osprey seizing it with his direct plunge into the lake, from which,
after a struggle that lasted sometimes a minute, the only sign of his
presence being the agitated water, he would emerge with the fish in
his claws and sail aloft, hurrying to escape to the forest with his
prey lest the eagle, always watching from the upper air, should rob
him of his hard-earned booty. Once I saw the eagle make the mighty
plunge from far above, the frightened osprey dropping the fish to
escape the shock, and the eagle catching it in midair as it fell.
The little incidents of woodland life took the place of all other
diversions and left no hour void of interest. I broke up the camp only
when