The third day dawned bluer, balmier even than its predecessor, and we launched just below the Galt dam, with various friends and the omnipresent small boy in full force to wish us good luck, for this was to be our day of days, inasmuch as we were to brave the [?] rapids of the run.

We skirled silently through the pretty town and in an hour were drifting between the velvetiest banks and greenest shores in the province. Then came some bolder outlines, followed by a wee village called Glenmorris, whose existence is proclaimed solely by the presence of a single stone building and a dam. We braved the latter in great style, running straight, with bow plumb ahead. The little crafts pitched, leapt, dipped, then slid royally through the foot foam with never a treacherous tilt from either of them. Then came the Chicopee dam, a roaring torrent of hamessed water, which the boys ran with mad [?] it; he said he had two children at home who needed a father for a few years longer. On we rushed restlessly, dodging the boulders that began to spring up like mushrooms everywhere. A few moments more and what is the sweet, far sound that reaches our ears? Ah! The rapids at last, skirling, rollicking, far to forward, and above their laughter the steady rush of waters, falling athwart another dam.

"It’s the stone dam. " shouts back Benedict, "Hang on all, look slippy, and we’ll run her. "

For reasons above mentioned the Benedicts took the quietest break under the lee shore, but the rest of us- what did we care? "Plunge for the center and head for the big recurl, " screamed Nip, heading the way. Then his canoe leapt, shot out straight, was lost to View for a second, only to reappear, riding high on the terrible black curling waves that dashed him about like a straw. In another second we were in it, and for two minutes I think my eyes stood out like cannon balls. The bow upraised in mid air, then plunged headlong into a wave that loomed a solid wall of water right ahead. We split her crest in twain, and I got about two pails of water slapped right onto my chest. The canoe lunged, toppled, righted herself, then met the second wave fair and square bow off. Another deluge of water and I thought we were swamped, but not a bit of it. The taut little Wild Cat rode regally through wave after wave until she dropped into the comparative calm at the foot of her namesake.

A shout of triumph arose from all hands, or rather all throats, and then followed a general break for shore, where we emptied out the canoes and wrung out the cushions and kit.

"What’s next?" demanded Jearmie, who is the greatest dare-devil alive (for her size). Some one replied, "The Eleven Link Rapids." The very name of it went to my head like wine. Full often had I heard of this famous stretch of seven miles, wherein eleven wildcats followed one another like the links in a chain, with but a few yards space between wherein you could breathe and grasp you r paddle with renewed vigor.

"Tuck, " I said, "I shall steer through these; you take the bow. "

"All right," he assented. "You know best what you can do."

Accordingly I tucked his big form away forward, brought the kit aft, and, kneeling at the stern thwart, I grasped my paddle for business.

There is nothing in life that sends me as crazy as a rapid. My brain goes aflame when I see the distant whitecaps, my heart pulses wildly with the first faint music of waters galloping madly over their rocky obstructions, singing, surging, laughing their endless, restless poetry--the world holds no such music for me as the cool calling of waters that my bow will kiss and conquer before the hour is over.