Page:Athletics and Manly Sport (1890).djvu/274

Rh up! And how unselfishly these two canoemen (who were going on a two-weeks' cruise on Lake Champlain) tore their chart in two, and gave us that part which included the Connecticut River.

When Dr. Guiteras and I started from Boston, we intended to take water at White-River Junction; but, when we reached that place, we found the river full of logs,—the largest quantity ever cut in one year going down this season. But the "end of the logs" was only a few miles above the White River; and we were told that, by going farther up, we should have it all clear as we came down, and might follow the logs to Holyoke.

So we took our little boat farther up, till we came to a favorable spot for launching, and there we slid her into the river from a marvellous white sand-bank, which ran into the deep, slow stream, and from which we took our first glorious "header" into the Connecticut.

All along the river, down to Middletown, hundreds of miles away, we found, at intervals, this remarkable kind of sand-bank on which one may take a race, and dive directly into deep water. And yet the bank is not straight, under water, but a rapid incline, easy and pleasant for landing.

What need of details? Miles in a voyage are of no more account than years in a life: they may