University of Vermont - Ariel Yearbook (Burlington, VT)

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20 THE ARIEL, 1908 Eddas. Having exhausted his evenings repertoire, VVilliam then departed in the canoe for a visit to his mother-in-law's home, a mile across the water. Vtfe noticed, as he left the camp-Hre, that his hip-pocket was bulging suspiciously. Early dawn saw the return of the canoe and of a sadder and more sober William. His back-pocket was empty now, but he had known disappointingly little of the joys in solution there, for the old lady,', he confessed, had knocked the pint silly. Under the pretext of seeking a can-opener, we tendered our respects to the dowager in a morning-call of such ceremony as was due the home of one of the first families-the household being of mingled Indian and Eskimo strain. The matriarch denied her presence to us in a manner that suggested sundry shrewd counter-blows from the spirited pint: but the maidens of the house, whose dumpy little bodies and thick ankles did little to suggest the romantic figures lithe as panther forest-roaming that dance across the pages of the elegant Monsieur Chateaubriand, discharged the sacred duties of hospitality by posing in penguin wise before our cameras. A more distinguished, if less Winsome, member of the connection, was visited at high noon :-XVil- liam's brother-in-law, Eskimo Peter or Hboozy foozled Petef as his friends not so potent in potting dubbed him with respectful envy. Peter's vocation was that of gentleman-farmer on the Montreal River near the Matawabika Falls, in which favored region he promoted the culture of the potato with an ardor worthy the attention of Mr. Luther Burbank. Like another country-dweller, Horace, love of the town and of ambrosial nights CHO noctes coenaeque Deum! j sometimes summoned him from his Sabine Farm. Yet, even after genial urban hours of Udesipere in loco,', he was so loyal to the open road that on such occasions he invariably selected this as a midnight couch. This love of the king's high- way had resulted three weeks since in an unfortunate encounter between Peters broad cheek and the wheel of a water-wagon. The wagon was said to have been put hopelessly out of commission-an outcome that awakened little grief in Haileybury, that town of thirsty souls-and Peter's Visage had been marred by three gaping cracks. Long experience with a canoe had taught him the value of pitch and resin in all cases of leakage, and three tarry seams across the jaw now kept water out and stronger fluid in. Peter's prowess with the canakin was Wllll31lliS never-failing topic. No wonder! 'Were they not Arcadians both ? As far as the Matawabika, Wfilliam had been in his own country, and his right as a leader of men had been unchallenged by us. But he was soon to tumble from his high estate: and sad is the story of his fall. All through the long narrows of Vlfaswaning and Obowanga he chanted a wild miserere of the

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THE ARIEL, 1908 19 of the bishop and then with miraculous agility emulated the free range of the queen. lyiy skilful maneuvering we checkmated him after several minutes' play, and led him captive to a seat in the smoker. So much for the Williaiii of the settlements. Behold now a transformation as sudden and complete as that in the old fables! Handle-'grip of axe or of paddle wrought as lightning a change as any wand of fairy godinother. Once in the woods or on the water, the uncertain shadow became a man-not only that, but a man with a past. It was of this past, a youthful time of cakes and ale and ginger hot i' the mouth that he discourscd in slow hesitating monologue, as his blade skilfully kept stroke with mine during our first two leagues on the Montreal River. He had gained and fought and fled from the law. He had led two wives to the church-door. He had visited many lands and found out many inventions. But the crowning glory of his life was his stay in Africa, where, in two years with rich English sportsmen, he had drunk deep of wonders undreamed of by Baker and Living- ston. This thrilling recital somehow recalled to me Othellois moving accidents by flood and fieldng and I began to wonder if, like that dusky gentleman, Wil- liam owed his vaunted success with the ladies to the dangers he had passed. Unsusceptible male creatures, even in the credulous hours of twilight and camp- fire-blaze, were, however, forced to boggle many times at the lions, hydras and chimaeras dire that growled, hissed or shrieked throughout the story of his wander-years. VVhich is coming it strong, yet I state but the facts was not always entirely convincing. That first night, prodigal in the after glow of the rosy that had cheered his day, VVilliam nearly bankrupted himself by too generous drafts on his funds of anecdote. As a story-teller he was far from contemptible. There were no quips and cranks in his style. His words were simple, his manner quiet, and the stuff itself, tremendous, magnificent: it was genuine nature or flagrant art. He spoke with full circumstance of a near-by island, where no one could find sleep, of an Ontario lake in whose seemingly still waters whirlpools were boiling, of a Quinze chute at whose base bleached the bones of many voyageurs, of a camp- ing ground on the Saguenay haunted -by the ghostly voice of a long-drowned luniberinan, chanting appealingly from that weird black river, Viens pour moi, viens pour moi. He dabbled in folk-tales, swimming through an hour-long story of a devil's mill, whose incessant grindings caused the sea to become salt: which veracious narrative Anson had heard from the lips of Portuguese sailors at New Bedford and I have since enjoyed in more lively form in the Old Norse

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THE ARIEL, 1908 21 portage into Lady Evelyn Lake. Nowhere in Canada, he wailed, was there such another carry. He shuddered in telling of the mighty cliffs, up which one sobbingly struggled even under the lightest pack, of the sharp rocks that pierced the toughest leather and of the fallen trees that beset the way in scores. It was known as The Giants Portage, and its mastery was a day's work for ordinary men. As it would be madness to attack this monster, jaded as we were by a days paddling in the rain, we must go into camp early and win, by many hours of rest, fresh strength for the morning assault, On the morrow, with icy tremors of apprehension coursing through our bones, we drew near to the spot of horror. Long was the agony deferred, until all on a sudden it flashed upon us that we were beholdiug the scene of a miracle. In the fashion of those cloud-capped towers of Prospero, the Giant .Portage had dissolved and like this insubstantial pageant faded left not a rack behind. And with its magical crumbling fell also to pieces the prestige of Wfilliam. At one blow he was unkinged from head to heel. Henceforth he might prate at will of lions in the way: ears were deaf, and eyes were fixed upon maps. The pupils now took their seat in the masters chair. As men of the coast bred on beaches with salt always in our nostrils, we had, I fear, but an imperfect sympathy with W'illiam's hatred of high wind and broad water. Like all of his kind he was totally ignorant of swimming: and, as a not unnatural consequence, erred from excess of caution. Despite our angry protests he would cling to a breaker-beaten shore rather than cross a lake in a breezeg and his fears at such times would furnish apprehensions enough to serve during a stormy ocean-voyage. The climax of his woes was reached one boisterous day, when we were fighting a head wind on the widest stretch of Temagami. The blast -became to him a savage personal enemy whom he loaded with reproaches, with bitter irony urging' the eternally condemned creature to blow, blow, blow. Through the centuries, Boreas has doubtless become pretty well accustomed to fervid exhortationsz- Blow, northern wind Send thou me my sweeting! Blow, northern wind, blow, blow, blow! But never since old Neptune's angry dressing down of the winds in the Aeneid passage, familiar to our school-days, had the poor fellows suffered such an uncomfortable quarter of an hour. And do you presume upon your birth? Dare you, winds, without my sovereign leave to embroil heaven and earth, and raise such mountains? Wfhom Il That is Mr. Bohn's reading of Vii-gil's lines: VVil1iam's version, while far more spirited, is less suited to ears polite