A motley little fleet awaited the party at the water's edge,--square-ended, flat-bottomed punts, sharp-bowed bateaux, long, graceful, dug-out canoes, and a commodious push-boat, with cabin and awning, whose motive power was poles. Elk River craft are as abundant as the log cabins on its banks, and their pilots are as numerous as the inhabitants. Neither sex nor size is a disqualification, for, excepting the trifling matter of being web-toed, all are provided from birth with water-going properties, and, be it seed-time or harvest, the river has the first claim upon them for all its varied sports and occupations. A shot at mallard, black-head, butter-duck, loon, wild goose, or blue-winged teal, as they follow the river's winds northward in the spring-time, will stop the ploughs furrowing its fertile bottoms as far as its echoes roll around mountain-juts, and cause the hands that held the lines to grasp old-fashioned rifles for a chance at the winged passers. When, later, woodcock seek its margins, gray snipe, kill-deer, mud-hens, and plovers its narrow fens, the scythe will rest in the half-mown field while its wielder "takes a crack at 'em." And when autumn brings thousands of gray squirrels, flocks of wild pigeon and water-fowl, to feed on its mast, no household obligation or out-door profit will keep the natives from shooting, morning, noon, and night. Some day in the near future a railroad will be built "up Elk," and then, while commerce and civilization will get a lift, the loveliest of rivers will be scarred; her trout-streams, carp-runs, bass-pools, salmon-swirls, deer-licks, bear-dens, partridge-nestles, and pheasant-covers will be overrun by sports-men, her magnificent mountains will be scratched bald-headed by lumbermen, her laughing tributaries will be saddened with saw-dust, and her queer, quaint, original boat-pullers and "seng-diggers" will wear shoes in summer-time and coats in winter, weather-board their log cabins, put glass in the windows and partitions across the one room inside. Woods-meetings will creep into churches, square sousing in the river will degenerate to the gentle baptismal sprinkle; no picnics or barbecues will delight the inhabitants with flying horses and fights, open fireplaces and sparking-benches will give way to stoves and chairs, riding double on horseback, with fair arms not afraid to hold tight against all dangers real or fancied, will be a joy of the past, "bean-stringin's," "apple-parin's," "punkin-clippin's," "sass-bilin's," "sugar-camps," "cabin-raisin's," "log-rollin's," "bluin's," "tar-and-feathering," and "hangin's," will be out-civilized, and the whole country will be spoiled.