Page:Familiar letters of Henry David Thoreau.djvu/406

 380 FRIENDS AND FOLLOWERS. [1858,

waska and St. John s to Frederickton, or fais. ther, almost all the way down stream a very important consideration.

I went to Moosehead in company with a party of four who were going a-hunting down the Alle- gash and St. John s, and thence by some other stream over into the Restigouche, and down that to the Bay of Chaleur, to be gone six weeks. Our northern terminus was an island in Heron Lake on the Allegash. ( Vide Colton s railroad and township map of Maine.)

The Indian proposed that we should return to Bangor by the St. John s and Great Schoodic Lake, which we had thought of ourselves ; and he showed us on the map where we should be each night. It was then noon, and the next day night, continuing down the Allegash, we should have been at the Mada waska settlements, having made only one or two portages ; and thereafter, on the St. John s there would be but one or two more falls, with short carries ; and if there was not too much wind, we could go down that stream one hundred miles a day. It is settled all the way below Madawaska. He knew the route well. He even said that this was easier, and would take but little more time, though much farther, than the route we decided on, i. e., by Webster Stream, the East Branch, and main Penobscot to Oldtown ; but he may have