in a country so beautiful and a season so delightful that it would have seemed to them a perfect paradise but for the savage tribes who kept them ever on the qui vive.
They soon passed from the immediate embrace of stupendous heights and dark gorges to a land of sloping ridges, which divided the country into a hundred luxuriant vales, composed part of woodland and part of prairie. Through these, numerous rivers and streams flowed deviously, beautifying the landscape and enriching the land. There were also many lakes of all sizes, and these swarmed with fish, while in some of them were found the much-sought-after and highly-esteemed beaver. Salt springs and hot springs of various temperatures abounded here, and many of the latter were so hot that meat could be boiled in them. Salt existed in all directions in abundance and of good quality. A sulphurous spring was also discovered, bubbling out from the base of a perpendicular rock three hundred feet high. In short, the land presented every variety of feature calculated to charm the imagination and delight the eye.
It was a mysterious land, too; for broad rivers burst in many places from the earth, flowed on for a short space, and then disappeared as if by magic into the earth from which they rose. Natural bridges spanned the torrents in many places, and some of these were so correctly formed that it was difficult to believe they had not been built by the hand of man. They often appeared opportunely to our trappers, and saved them the trouble and danger of fording rivers. Frequently the whole band would stop in silent wonder and awe as they listened to the rushing of waters under their feet, as if another world of streams, and rapids, and cataracts were flowing below the crust of earth on which they stood.
Wild berries of all kinds were found in abundance, and wild vegetables, besides many nutritious roots. Among other fish, splendid salmon were found in the lakes and rivers, and animal life swarmed on hill and in dale. Woods and valleys, plains and ravines, teemed with it. On every plain the red-deer grazed in herds by the banks of lake and stream. Wherever there were clusters of poplar and elder trees and saplings, the beaver was seen nibbling industriously with his sharp teeth, and committing as much havoc in the forest as if he had been armed with the woodman’s axe; others sported in the eddies, Racoons sat in
