l arose from the terrified
assemblage, who were unable to render the poor fellow any assistance,
and who ran about in frantic excitement. The canoe was lost, being
carried at a rapid rate into the open lake, where it capsized, and sunk
immediately. After dragging for the body for upwards of an hour, it was
fished up from under some logs of timber moored some distance below
where the catastrophe occurred. The body being landed and placed on the
bank, a loud altercation ensued as to the means to be used to attempt
resuscitation--a vain hope--but still persisted in by those assembled.
Some wanted to roll it on a barrel, others to suspend it by the heels,
that the water might be voided. At length a doctor arrived, and, after
some inquiry, pronounced effort useless, from the time the body had been
under water. This at once damped the ardour of the crowd, although it
did not discourage a female, who had taken a prominent part in the
operations, and who, with that true womanly tenderness and solicitude
which do honour to her sex, and which are nowhere more conspicuous than
in America, insisted upon the corpse being taken to a neighbouring
house, where, like a ministering angel, she persevered in her efforts
for a considerable time, although of course without effect.

The banks of Lake Erie, in the vicinity of Huron, are thickly studded
with small trees and coppice wood. This scenery, being interspersed with
open natural meadow-land, gives it a park-like aspect, and several spots
would, graced with a mansion, have formed an estate any nobleman in
Europe might have been proud of, the shores of Canada, looming in the
hazy distance, giving a fine effect to the scene.

The noise and disagreeable odour arising from the bull-frogs and other
reptiles that infest the swamp opposite the village at night, filled the
air, and rendered it impossible for me to sleep. As I lay restless on my
bed, I suddenly heard a gun fired, and, starting up in some alarm, I
hastily put on my clothes and descended to the bar of the hotel. Here
several of the inmates were assembled, and were preparing to cross the
creek with lanterns, to explore the swamp, cries of distress having been
distinctly heard, as of some benighted traveller who had lost his way.
After listening intently, and firing several rifles to guide the
wanderer or apprize him that assistance was at hand, the party crossed
the creek in a canoe, and moved along the skirts of the morass,
hallo