ht of our campfire and came upon Hubbard
frying bacon. George and I were too tired to eat; we were glad to lie
down in our wet clothes on the bed of spruce boughs that was ready for
us and forget our troubles in sleep.

We rested on Sunday--and ate. A partridge I had shot the day before
was served stewed with rice and bacon for dinner, while for supper we
had twenty-two trout that Hubbard caught in the morning, served with
apple sauce and hot bread. This high living fully recompensed us for
our hard fight against nature and the elements, and once more full of
hope we lay down to sleep.

In the morning (Monday, July 27) Hubbard arose with a feeling of
depression, but fair progress during the day brightened him up. A
typical fall wind blew all day, and we were very wet and very cold when
we went into camp at night. But with the coming of evening the clouds
were driven away before the wind, affording us an occasional glimpse of
the new moon hanging low in the heavens; and this, together with the
sound of the river and the roaring campfire, soon cheered us up. No
matter how weary and discouraged we were during the day, our evening
fire invariably brought to us a feeling of indescribable happiness, a
sweet forgetfulness of everything but the moment's comfort.

Our fire that Monday night was no exception to the general rule, but
after supper, while we were luxuriantly reclining before it on a couch
of boughs, Hubbard gave expression to a strange feeling that had been
growing on him and me in the last few days. It was almost as if the
solitude were getting on our nerves. Hubbard was munching a piece of
black chocolate, which he dipped at intervals in a bit of sugar held in
the palm of his left hand, when he said:

"It's queer, but I have a feeling that is getting stronger from day to
day, that we are the only people left in the world. Have you fellows
experienced any such feeling?"

"Yes," said I; "I have. I have been feeling that we must forever be
alone, going on, and on, and on, from portage to portage, through this
desolate wilderness."

"That's it exactly," said Hubbard. "You sort of feel, that as you are
now, so you always have been and always will be; and your past life is
like a dream, and your friends like dream-folk. What a strange
sensation it is! Have you felt that way, George?"

George took the pipe from his mouth, blew out a cloud of tobacco smoke
to join the smoke of the fire, and spat medit