The Long Labrador Trail | Page 7

at the time that I finally succeeded in recovering
the body. Tom's daughter, Lillie, was Mackenzie's little housekeeper,
who showed me so many kindnesses then. The whole family, in fact,
were very good to me during those trying days, and I count them
among my true and loyal friends.
We had supper with Cotter, who sang some Hudson's Bay songs,
Richards sang a jolly college song or two, Stanton a "classic," and then
all who could sing joined in "Auld Lang Syne."
My thoughts were of that other day, when Hubbard, so full of hope, had
begun this same journey-of the sunshine and fleecy clouds and
beckoning fir tops, and I wondered what was in store for us now.
CHAPTER III
THE LAST OF CIVILIZATION

The time for action had come. Our canoes were loaded near the wharf,
we said good-by to Cotter and a group of native trapper friends, and as
we took our places in the canoes and dipped our paddles into the waters
that were to carry us northward the Post flag was run up on the flagpole
as a salute and farewell, and we were away. We soon rounded the point,
and Cotter and the trappers and the Post were lost to view. Duncan was
to follow later in the evening in his rowboat with some of our outfit
which we left in his charge.
Silently we paddled through the "little lake." The clouds hung somber
and dull with threatening rain, and a gentle breeze wafted to us now
and again a bit of fragrance from the spruce-covered hills above us.
Almost before I realized it we were at the rapid. Away to the westward
stretched Grand Lake, deep and dark and still, with the rugged outline
of Cape Corbeau in the distance.
Tom Blake and his family, one and all, came out to give us the whole-
souled, hospitable welcome of "The Labrador." Even Atikamish, the
little Indian dog that Mackenzie used to have, but which he had given
to Tom when he left Northwest River, was on hand to tell me in his dog
language that he remembered me and was delighted to see me back.
Here we would stay for the night--the last night for months that we
were to sleep in a habitation of civilized man.
The house was a very comfortable little log dwelling containing a small
kitchen, a larger living-room which also served as a sleeping- room,
and an attic which was the boys' bedroom. The house was comfortably
furnished, everything clean to perfection, and the atmos- phere of love
and home that dwelt here was long remembered by us while we
huddled in many a dreary camp during the weeks that followed.
Duncan did not come that night, and it was not until ten o'clock the
next morning (June twenty-seventh) that he appeared. Then we made
ready for the start. Tom and his young son Henry announced their
intention of accompanying us a short distance up Grand Lake in their
small sailboat. Mrs. Blake gave us enough bread and buns, which she
had baked especially for us, to last two or three days, and she gave us
also a few fresh eggs, saying, "'Twill be a long time before you has

eggs again."
At half-past ten o'clock our canoes were afloat, farewell was said, and
we were beyond the last fringe of civilization.
The morning was depressing and the sky was overcast with
low-hanging, heavy clouds, but almost with our start, as if to give us
courage for our work and fire our blood, the leaden curtain was drawn
aside and the deep blue dome of heaven rose above us. The sun shone
warm and bright, and the smell of the fresh damp forest, the incense of
the wilderness gods, was carried to us by a puff of wind from the south
which enabled Duncan to hoist his sails. The rest of us bent to our
paddles, and all were eager to plunge into the unknown and solve the
mystery of what lay beyond the horizon.
Our nineteen-foot canoe was manned by Pete in the bow, Stanton in the
center and Easton in the stern, while I had the bow and Richards the
stern of the eighteen-foot canoe. We paddled along the north shore of
the lake, close to land. Stanton, with an eye for fresh meat, espied a
porcupine near the water's edge and stopped to kill it, thus gaining the
honor of having bagged the first game of the trip. At twelve o'clock we
halted for luncheon, in almost the same spot where Hubbard and I had
lunched when going up Grand Lake two years before. While Pete
cooked bacon and eggs and made tea, Stanton and Richards dressed the
porcupine for supper.
After luncheon we cut diagonally across