After supper, strolling along the beach, we debated the best way of escape; whether to send one of our canoes around the eastern shore of the lake that night, to meet the steamer at the Island House and bring it to our rescue; or to set out the next morning, and paddle both canoes around the western end of the lake, thirty miles, to the Hotel Roberval.  While we were talking, we came to a dry old birch-tree, with ragged, curling bark.  “Here is a torch,” cried Damon, “to throw light upon the situation.”  He touched a match to it, and the flames flashed up the tall trunk until it was transformed into a pillar of fire.  But the sudden illumination burned out, and our counsels were wrapt again in darkness and uncertainty, when there came a great uproar of steam-whistles from the lake.  They must be signalling for us.  What could it mean?

We fired our guns, leaped into a canoe, leaving two of the guides to break camp, and paddled out swiftly into the night.  It seemed an endless distance before we found the feeble light where the crippled launch was tossing at anchor.  The captain shouted something about a larger steamboat and a raft of logs, out in the lake, a mile or two beyond.  Presently we saw the lights, and the orange glow of the cabin windows.  Was she coming, or going, or standing still?  We paddled on as fast as we could, shouting and firing off a revolver until we had no more cartridges.  We were resolved not to let that mysterious vessel escape us, and threw ourselves with energy into the novel excitement of chasing a steamboat in the dark.

Then the lights began to swing around; the throbbing of paddle-wheels grew louder and louder; she was evidently coming straight toward us.  At that moment it flashed upon us that, while she had plenty of lights, we had none!  We were lying, invisible, right across her track.  The character of the steamboat chase was reversed.  We turned and fled, as the guides say, a quatre pattes, into illimitable space, trying to get out of the way of our too powerful friend.  It makes considerable difference, in the voyage of life, whether you chase the steamboat, or the steamboat chases you.

Meantime our other canoe had approached unseen.  The steamer passed safely between the two boats, slackening speed as the pilot caught our loud halloo!  She loomed up above us like a man-of-war, and as we climbed the ladder to the main-deck we felt that we had indeed gotten out of the wilderness.  My old friend, Captain Savard, made us welcome.  He had been sent out, much to his disgust, to catch a runaway boom of logs and tow it back to Roberval; it would be an all night affair; but we must take possession of his stateroom and make ourselves comfortable; he would certainly bring us to the hotel in time for breakfast.  So he went off on the upper deck, and we heard him stamping about and yelling to his crew as they struggled to get their unwieldy drove of six thousand logs in motion.