LIARD POST 85

decided to go down to the Point, farther down the
bank. We took a gun and some fly-oil and went out.

Butterflies fluttered round our feet, their black-
edged yellow wings overlapping and interlacing in
low, incessant flight. The grass was golden in the
sunlight. The cabin window glared at us with a
blind, flashing eye. Swallows darted excitedly back
and forth with stuff for their nests over the door-
way. We walked among tall daisies and spidery
erass toward the edge of the clearing, and the sun-
light fell behind us as we followed the trail into
spruce. Between the trees there was a drone of
insects and a brown carpet and a warm stillness.
- Yielding green moss grew over the roots of trees.
There were flowers like yellow stars underfoot, and
tall pale flowers, and blue, bell-like flowers on deli-
cate stalks. There were treeless patches where the
faint, sweet scent hovered above the shadowy blue
of lupines. A cloud of mosquitoes followed each of
us like a ghost along the trail, stopping when we
stopped and moving as we moved until we came
out upon the Point. Here the darkness of the forest
jutted out into a golden river. We turned to look
up-stream, where the Dease and the Upper Liard
_came gleaming along their separate courses and
drew together from either side of the black wedge
of land under the splendour of a sinking sun. Wild