Beyond the town again might be obtained a view of the high and cultivated banks, sweeping in gentle curve until they at length terminated in a low and sandy spot, called from the name of its proprietor, Elliott’s Point.  This stretched itself toward the eastern extremity of the island, so as to leave the outlet to the lake barely wide enough for a single vessel to pass at a time, and that not without skilful pilotage and much caution.

Assuming our reader to be now as fully familiar with the scene as ourselves, let him next, in imagination, people it, as on the occasion we have chosen for his introduction.  It was a warm, sunny, day in the early part of July.  The town itself was as quiet as if the glaive of war reposed in its sheath, and the inhabitants pursued their wonted avocations with the air of men who had nothing in common with the active interest which evidently dominated the more military portions of the scene.  It was clear that among these latter some cause for excitement existed, fat, independently of the unceasing bustle within the dock yard—­a bustle which however had but one undivided object-the completion and equipment of the large vessel then on the stacks—­the immediate neighbourhood of the fort presented evidence of some more than ordinary interest.  The encampment of the Indians, on the verge of the forest, had given forth the great body of their warriors, and these clad in their gayest apparel, covered with feathers and leggings of bright colours, decorated with small tinkling bells that came not inharmoniously on the ear, as they kept tone to the measured walk of their proud wearers, were principally assembled around and in front of the large building we have described as being without, yet adjacent to, the fort.  These warriors might have been about a thousand in number, and amused themselves variously—­(the younger at least)—­with leaping—­wrestling—­ball playing-and the foot race—­in all which exercises they are unrivalled.  The elders bore no part in these amusements, but stood, or sat cross legged, on the edge of the bank, smoking their pipes, and expressing their approbation of the prowess or dexterity of the victors in the games, by guttural, yet rapidly uttered exclamations.  Mingled with these were some six or seven individuals, whose glittering costume of scarlet announced them for officers of the garrison, and elsewhere dispersed, some along the banks and crowding the battery in front of the fort, or immediately around the building, yet quite apart from their officers, were a numerous body of the inferior soldiery.

But although these distinct parties were assembled, to all appearance, with a view, the one to perform in, the other to witness, the active sports we have enumerated, a close observer of the movements of all would hare perceived there was something more important in contemplation, to the enactment of which these exercises were but a prelude.  Both officers, and men, and even the participators in the sports,