_The Romance of Dollard_, which appeared in the _Century_ in 1888, and the other romances that swiftly followed, are no more like the earlier work of the author than if they had been written by another hand. It was as if a new and brilliant writer had suddenly appeared. The suddenness, however, was only a seeming suddenness: the romances were in reality the culmination of a long and careful period of apprenticeship. Her style, to be sure, had been influenced by Parkman: one cannot read a page without feeling that. There is the same incisive, nervous manner; the same impetuous rush and vigor as if the wild Northern winds were filling the paragraphs; the same short and breathless sentences in descriptions of action, packed with excitement and dramatic force. Yet there is vastly more than Parkman in her work. There is a wealth of poetry and spiritual force in it, a healthy sentiment, a skilful selecting and blending of romantic elements, and a Hardy-like power to catch the spirit of a locality so as to make it almost a personality in the tragedy. This background of wilderness, this monotone of the savage North, is never absent. At the beginning of every story and every chapter is struck, as it were, the dominating key. Here is the opening paragraph of "The Windigo": The cry of those rapids in Ste. Marie's River called the Sault could be heard at all hours through the settlement on the rising shore and into the forest beyond. Three quarters of a mile of frothing billows, like some colossal instrument, never ceased playing music down an inclined channel until the trance of winter locked it up. At August dusk, when all that shaggy world was sinking to darkness, the gushing monotone became very distinct. These rapids with their mournful cry become a character in the story; they dominate every page until at the end they rescue the hero, bearing in his arms the frightful "windigo," in a page of action that stirs the blood. The Canadian wilds of the _coureurs de bois_, the roar of swollen rivers, the sudden storms that lash the forests, the terror and the mystery of night in the savage woods, and evermore the river, the black St. Lawrence--one feels them like a presence. Like Cable, too, she can make her reader share the superstitious thrill of the region. Her _windigos_ and _loup-garous_ lay hold on one like a hand out of the dark.