Group of Islands
This day we had a most delightful run among hundreds of islands; sometimes darting through narrow rocky channels, so narrow that I could not see the water on either side of the canoe; and then emerging, we glided through vast fields of white water-lilies; it was perpetual variety, perpetual beauty, perpetual delight and enchantment, from hour to hour. The men sang their gay French songs, the other canoe joining in the chorus.
This peculiar singing has often been described; it is very animated on the water and in the open air, but not very harmonious. They all sing in unison, raising their voices and marking the time with their paddles. One always led, but in these there was a diversity of taste and skill. If I wished to hear “En roulant ma boule, roulette,” I applied to Le Duc. Jacques excelled in “La belle rose blanche,” and Lewis was great in “Trois canards s’en vont baignant.”
They often amused me by a specimen of dexterity, something like that of an accomplished whip in London. They would paddle up towards the rocky shore with such extreme velocity, that I expected to be dashed on the rock, and then in a moment, by a simultaneous back-stroke of the paddle, stop with a jerk, which made me breathless.
My only discomposure arose from the destructive propensities of the gentlemen, all keen and eager sportsmen; the utmost I could gain from their mercy was, that the fish should gasp to death out of my sight, and the pigeons and the wild ducks be put out of pain instantly. I will, however, acknowledge, that when the bass-fish and pigeons were produced, broiled and fried, they looked so appétissants, smelt so savoury, and I was so hungry, that I soon forgot all my sentimental pity for the victims.
We found to-day, on a rock, the remains of an Indian lodge, over which we threw a sail-cloth, and dined luxuriously on our fish and pigeons, and a glass of good madeira. After dinner, the men dashed off with great animation, singing my favourite ditty,
“Si mon moine voulait danser,
Un beau cheval lui donnerai!”
through groups of lovely islands, sometimes scattered wide, and sometimes clustered so close, that I often mistook twenty or thirty together for one large island; but on approaching nearer, they opened before us and appeared intersected by winding labyrinthine channels, where, amid flags and water-lilies, beneath the shade of rich embowering foliage, we glided on our way; and then we came upon a wide open space, where we could feel the heave of the waters under us, and across which the men—still singing with untiring vivacity—paddled with all their might to reach the opposite islands before sunset. The moment it becomes too dark for our steersman to see through the surface of the water, it becomes in the highest degree dangerous to proceed; such is the frail texture of these canoes, that a pin’s point might scratch a hole in the bottom; a sunk rock, or a snag or projecting bough—and often we glided within an inch of them—had certainly swamped us.
We passed this day two Indian sepulchres, on a point of rock, with the sparkling waters murmuring round it, and over-shadowed by birch and pine. I landed to examine them. The Indians cannot here bury their dead, there not being a sufficiency of earth to cover them from sight, but they lay the body, wrapped up carefully in bark, on the flat rock, and then cover it over with rocks and stones. This was the tomb of a woman and her child, and fragments of the ornaments and other things buried with them were still perceptible.
We landed at sunset on a flat ledge of rock, free from bushes, which we avoided as much as possible, from fear of mosquitoes and rattle-snakes; and while the men pitched the marquees and cooked supper, I walked and mused.
I wish I could give you the least idea of the beauty of this evening; but while I try to put in words what was before me, the sense of its ineffable loveliness overpowers me now even as it did then. The sun had set in that cloudless splendour, and that peculiar blending of rose and amber light that belongs only to these climes and Italy; the lake lay weltering under the western sky like a bath of molten gold; the rocky islands which studded its surface were of a dense purple, except where their edges seemed fringed with fire. They assumed, to the visionary eye, strange forms; some were like great horned beetles, and some like turtles, and some like crocodiles, and some like sleeping whales, and winged fishes. The foliage upon them resembled dorsal fins, and sometimes tufts of feathers: then, as the purple shadows came darkening from the east, the young crescent moon showed herself, flinging a paly splendour over the water. I remember standing on the shore, “my spirits as in a dream were all bound up,” and overcome by such an intense feeling of the beautiful, such a deep adoration for the power that had created it, I must have suffocated if——
But why tell you this?
They pitched my tent at a respectful distance from the rest, and made me a delicious elastic bed of some boughs, over which was spread a bear-skin, and over that blankets: but the night was hot and feverish. The voyageurs, after rowing since daylight, were dancing and singing on the shore till near midnight.
Next morning we were off again at early dawn, paddled “trois pipes” before breakfast, over an open space which they call a “traverse,” caught eleven bass-fish, and shot two pigeons. The island on which we breakfasted was in great part white marble; and in the clefts and hollows grew quantities of gooseberries and raspberries, wild roses, the crimson columbine, a large species of harebell, a sort of willow, juniper, birch, and stunted pine, and such was the usual vegetation.
It is beautiful to see in these islands the whole process of preparatory vegetation unfolded and exemplified before one’s eyes, each successive growth preparing a soil for that which is to follow.
There was first the naked rock washed by the spray, where the white gulls were sitting: then you saw the rock covered with some moss or lichens; then in the clefts and seams, some long grass, a few wild flowers and strawberries; then a few juniper and rose bushes; then the dwarf pine, hardly rising two or three feet, and lastly trees and shrubs of large growth; and the nearer to the mainland, the richer of course the vegetation, for the seeds are wafted thence by the winds, or carried by the birds, and so dispersed from island to island.