Page:Familiar letters of Henry David Thoreau.djvu/408

 382 FRIENDS AND FOLLOWERS. [1858,

The fourth morning you will make the carry of two miles to Mud Pond (Allegash Water), and a very wet carry it is, and reach Chamberlain Lake by noon, and Heron Lake, perhaps, that night, after a couple of very short carries at the outlet of Chamberlain. At the end of two days more you will probably be at Madawaska. Of course the Indian can paddle twice as far in a day as he commonly does.

Perhaps you would like a few more details. We used (three of us) exactly twenty-six pounds of hard bread, fourteen pounds of pork, three pounds of coffee, twelve pounds of sugar (and could have used more), besides a little tea, In dian meal, and rice, and plenty of berries and moose-meat. This was faring very luxuriously. I had not formerly carried coffee, sugar, or rice. But for solid food, I decide that it is not worth the while to carry anything but hard bread and pork, whatever your tastes and habits may be. These wear best, and you have no time nor dishes in which to cook anything else. Of course you will take a little Indian meal to fry fish in ; and half a dozen lemons also, if you have sugar, will be very refreshing, for the water is warm. 1

1 Charming says (Thoreau, p. 35): &quot;Thoreau made for himself a knapsack, with partitions for books and papers, India-rubber cloth, strong and large-spaced, the common