Towards evening Bishop Grouard and Father Lacombe held a well-attended service, which in this profound wilderness was peculiarly impressive.

Listening, one thought how often the same service, these same chants and canticles, had awakened the sylvan echoes in like solitudes on the St.Lawrence and Mississippi in the old days of exploration and trade, and of missionary zeal and suffering.

It recalled, too, the thought of man's evanescence and the apparent fixedness of his institutions.
Shortly after our tents were pitched a boat drifted past with five jaded-looking men aboard--more baffled Klondikers returning from Peace River.

We had heard of numbers in the interior who could neither go on nor return, and expected to meet more castaways before we reached the lake.

In this we were not astray, and several days after in the upper river we met a York boat loaded with them, alert and unmistakable Americans, but with the worn features of disappointed men.
We were now constantly encountering the rapids, which extended for about twenty-five miles, and very difficult and troublesome they proved to be to our heavily-loaded craft.