He was river-driver, woodsman, hunter, carpenter, guide, as whim or opportunity came to him.

On the evening when Charley Steele met with his mishap he was a river-driver--or so it seemed.

He had been up nor'west a hundred and fifty miles, and he had come down-stream alone with his raft-which in the usual course should take two men to guide it--through slides, over rapids, and in strong currents.

Defying the code of the river, with only one small light at the rear of his raft, he voyaged the swift current towards his home, which, when he arrived opposite the Cote Dorion, was still a hundred miles below.

He had watched the lights in the river-drivers' camps, had seen the men beside the fires, and had drifted on, with no temptation to join in the songs floating out over the dark water, to share the contents of the jugs raised to boisterous lips, or to thrust his hand into the greasy cooking-pot for a succulent bone.
He drifted on until he came opposite Charlemagne's tavern.