“Ugh!” said Dolly.  “I should think it would shake you to pieces.”

“It does, pretty nearly,” said Eleanor, with a smile.  “One usually only rides over one once—­after that one walks, and is glad of the chance.”

When, after a three-mile tramp, Eleanor, who was in front, stopped suddenly at a point where the trees thinned out, on top of a ridge, and called out, “Here’s the lake, girls!” there was a wild rush to reach her side.  And the view, when they got the first glimpse of it, was certainly worth all the trouble it had caused them.

Before them stretched a long body of water, sapphire blue in the twilight, with pink shadows where the setting sun was reflected.  Perhaps two miles long, the lake was, at its widest point, not more than a quarter of a mile across, whence, of course, came its name.  About it the land sloped down on all sides, into a cup-like depression that formed the lake, so that there was, on all four sides, a tree crowned ridge.  From a point about half way to the far end of the lake smoke rose in the calm evening air.

“Oh, how beautiful!” cried Bessie.  “It’s the loveliest place I ever saw.  And how wonderful the smell is.”

“That’s from the pine trees,” said Eleanor.  She sighed, as if overcome by the calm beauty of the scene, as, indeed, she was.  “It’s always beautiful here—­but Sometimes I think it’s most beautiful in winter, when the lake is covered with ice, and the trees are all weighed down with snow.  Then, of course, you can walk or skate all over the lake—­it’s frozen four and five feet deep, as a rule, by January.”

Dolly shivered.

“But isn’t it awfully cold here?” she inquired “Oh, yes; but it’s so dry that one doesn’t mind the cold half as much as we do at home when it’s really ten or fifteen degrees warmer, Dolly.  One dresses for it, too, you see, in thick, woolen things, and furs, and there’s such glorious sport.  You can break holes through the ice and fish, and then there are ice boats, and skating races, and all sorts of things.  Oh, it’s glorious.  I’ve been up here in winter a lot, and I really do think that’s best of all.”

Then she looked at the rising smoke.

“Well, we mustn’t stay here and talk any more,” she said.  “Come along, girls, it’s getting near to supper time.”

“Have we got to cook supper?” asked Dolly, anxiously.

“No, not to-night,” said Eleanor, with a laugh.  “The guides have done it for us, because I knew we’d all be tired and ready for a good rest, without any work to do.  But with breakfast tomorrow we’ll start in and do all our own work, just as we’ve done when we’ve been in camp before.”

Half an hour’s brisk walk took them to the site of the camp.  There there was a little sandy beach, and the tents had been pitched on ground was slightly higher.  Behind each tent a trench had been dug, so that, in case of rain, the water flowing down from the high ground in the rear would be diverted and carried down into the lake.