Two or three days spent on one of these wild mountain lakes, such as Lac a Comporte, is as pleasant an experience as any one can have.  The walk is beautiful from the last cottage where the vehicles are left and the two or three men are secured who shoulder the packs with the necessary provisions.  At first the forest path is hewn broadly in a straight line but it soon narrows to a trail winding up the mountain side.  The way is rough; one must clamber over occasional boulders and turn aside to avoid fallen trees.  The white stems of birches are conspicuous in the forest thicket.  After a stiff climb we have passed over the shoulder of the mountain; the path is now trending downward and at length through the arch of green over the pathway one catches the gleam of the lake.  The pace quickens and in a few minutes we stand upon the shore of a lovely little sheet of water with a shore line perhaps three miles long, lying in the mountain hollow.  Evening is near and, half an hour later, each fisherman is in a boat paddled softly by a habitant companion.  In a thousand places the calm water is disturbed by the trout feeding busily; they often throw themselves quite clear of the water and, when the sport has well begun, at a single cast one occasionally takes a trout on each of his three flies.  Before it is dark the whole circuit of the lake has been made and a goodly basket of trout is the result.

A camp at evening is always delightful.  The tired fishermen lie by the cheery fire while the men prepare the evening meal, to consist chiefly of the trout just caught.  They have the vivacity and readiness of their race:  rough habitants though they are their courtesy is inborn, inalienable.  After the meal is over silence often falls on the group of three or four by the fire.  Every one is tired and at barely nine o’clock it is time for bed.  Before each of the two or three small tents standing some distance apart by the water’s edge the men have built a blazing fire which throws its light far out over the tiny lake.  All round rise the mountains, now dark and sombre; a sharp wind is blowing and as one stands alone looking out over the water there comes a sense of chill; for a moment the mountain solitude seems remote, melancholy and friendless:  with something like a shiver one turns to the cheerful fire before the tent.  Here blankets are spread on sweet scented boughs of sapin; the bed is hard, but not too hard for a tired man and one quickly falls asleep.

Other fishing expeditions at Murray Bay take one farther afield and into more varied scenes.  In its upper stretches, three thousand feet above the sea, the Murray River flows through a level country before it plunges into mountain fastnesses, almost impregnable in summer, for a long and troubled detour, to emerge at length into this last valley.  To reach this flat upland one must drive through a beautiful mountain pass with great heights towering on either side of