In this vast desolation there was a mysterious quiet, except for the occasional sounds of wild life.

Partridges drummed back in the woods, flocks of ducks got up with a great rush of wings at almost every turn, and once, late in the morning of the first day out, Rod was thrilled by a crashing in the undergrowth scarcely a stone's throw from the canoe.
He could see saplings twisting and bending, and heard Wabi whisper behind him: "A moose!" They were words to set his hands trembling and his whole body quivering with anticipation.

There was in him now none of the old hunter's coolness, none of the almost stoical indifference with which the men of the big North hear these sounds of the wild things about them.

Rod had yet to see his first big game.
That moment came in the afternoon.

The canoe had skimmed lightly around a bend in the river.