About three or four o'clock--how little note we took of time!--we reached the rock on which the big steamer was still fast, stopping to give her another anchor and cable, and wishing her good luck and a speedy release.
We had been amusing ourselves during the afternoon by watching the cook on the barge dive up and down through the narrow doorway of a sort of box to a small rusty sheet-iron cooking-stove, with an equally rusty stove-pipe. First seizing an axe, he chopped up some wood from a pile in the corner, and filled the stove; then he dragged down a bag of flour into his den; then up again he started, as suddenly as a Jack-in-the-box, for a round tin; then for some flat pans. Next we heard him shouting from below, "Is that fire burning good, boys? Cram her full; pile in more wood, and don't heed the smoke!" and he suddenly appeared with the pans full of buns, which were quickly baked. Then, leaning over the railing of the barge, he cried--
"If you would have your tea now, ladies, while the buns are hot, and would pass along your tea-kettle, I have some tea ready for you."
Accepting his invitation with thanks, a tin can of buns was soon in our boat, and never did the lightest tea-buns, served in the daintiest of snowy napkins, taste more delicious. The number we demolished proved our appreciation of his cookery.
About sundown we altered our course. After passing a pretty green hill, from which a group of squaws, children, and dogs watched us, we turned to the west and entered Clear Water Bay. The night was getting dark, damp, and chilly, the children were sleepy, and we were tired and silent. The men on the tug had become quiet and drowsy; nothing seemed to stir but the flying sparks from the funnel of the tug, which dropped all around us, and not even a cry from a loon broke through the stillness.
Suddenly--"Here we are!" rang out from a dozen voices, followed by a heavy splash and a cry of "A man overboard!" While we peered out into the darkness, dreading we knew not what, a laugh came from the barge. It was only the short stove-pipe, which some one had knocked overboard in the darkness. In our relief at finding that the accident was nothing worse, we quite forgot the future misery of our poor friend the bun-maker, whose cookery would have to be carried on amidst redoubled volumes of smoke. A moment later the light of a camp fire appeared, and leaving the tug the barge was poled up to it. One of the engineers belonging to Mr. C----'s staff came to meet us. He had been ordered into town, and had waited at Clear Water two days for the tug or steamer to take him to the "Angle," intending, if they did not arrive before morning, to cross next day in a canoe.