[The Journey to the Polar Sea by John Franklin]@TWC D-Link bookThe Journey to the Polar Sea CHAPTER 6 43/53
In the long valley between, the smooth and colourless Clear Water River wound its spiral course, broken and shattered by encroaching woods.
An exuberance of rich herbage covered the soil and lofty trees climbed the precipice at our feet, hiding its brink with their summits.
Impatient as we were and blinded with pain we paid a tribute of admiration, which this beautiful landscape is capable of exciting unaided by the borrowed charms of a calm atmosphere, glowing with the vivid tints of evening. We descended to the banks of the Clear Water River and, having encamped, the two men returned to assist their companions.
We had sometimes before procured a little rest by closing the tent and burning wood or flashing gunpowder within, the smoke driving the mosquitoes into the crannies of the ground.
But this remedy was now ineffectual though we employed it so perseveringly as to hazard suffocation: they swarmed under our blankets, goring us with their envenomed trunks and steeping our clothes in blood. We rose at daylight in a fever and our misery was unmitigated during our whole stay. The mosquitoes of America resemble in shape those of Africa and Europe but differ essentially in size and other particulars.
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