WITH THE STRANGE PEOPLE After this came varying days of hardship by land and water, and then another danger.

One day they were, crossing a great northern lake.

The land was moist with the sweat of quick-springing verdure; flocks of wild fowl rose at all points, and herds of caribou came drinking and feeding at the shore.

The cries of herons, loons, and river-hens rose with strange distinctness, so delicate was the atmosphere, and the blue of the sky was exquisite.
As they paddled slowly along this lake, keeping time to their songs with the paddles, there suddenly grew out of the distance a great flotilla of canoes with tall prows, and behind them a range of islands which they had not before seen.

The canoes were filled with men--Indians, it would seem, by the tall feathers lifting from their heads.