CHAPTER XXXIV

AYLMER LAKE One of my objects was to complete the ambiguous shore line of Aylmer Lake. The first task was to find the lake. So we left the narrows and pushed on and on, studying the Back map, vainly trying to identify points, etc. Once or twice we saw gaps ahead that seemed to open into the great inland sea of Aylmer. But each in turn proved a mere bay.--On August 12 we left the narrows; on the 13th and 14th we journeyed westward seeking the open sea. On the morning of the 15th we ran into the final end of the farthest bay we could discover and camped at the mouth of a large river entering in. As usual, we landed--Preble, Billy, and I--to study topography, Weeso to get firewood, and curiously enough, there was more firewood here than we had seen since leaving Artillery Lake. The reason of this appeared later. I was utterly puzzled. We had not yet found Aylmer Lake, and had discovered an important river that did not seem to be down on any map. We went a mile or two independently and studied the land from all the high hills; evidently we had crossed the only great sheet of water in the region. About noon, when all had assembled at camp, I said: "Preble, why, isn't this Lockhart's River, at the western extremity of Aylmer Lake?" The truth was dawning on me. He also had been getting light and slowly replied: "I have forty-nine reasons why it is, and none at all why it isn't." There could be no doubt of it now. The great open sea of Aylmer was a myth. Back never saw it; he passed in a fog, and put down with a query the vague information given him by the Indians. This little irregular lake, much like Clinton-Colden, was Aylmer. We had covered its length and were now at its farthest western end, at the mouth of Lockhart's River. How I did wish that explorers would post up the names of the streets; it is almost as bad as in New York City. What a lot of time we might have saved had we known that Sandy Bay was in Back's three-fingered peninsula! Resolving to set a good example I left a monument at the mouth of the river. The kind of stone made it easy to form a cross on top. This will protect it from wandering Indians; I do not know of anything that will protect it from wandering white men.