Once in the river, we experienced a most extraordinary transformation. Every one knows what it is to pass in a day or two from northern snow to southern roses, or in a few hours from valley roses to mountain snow; but here, _in five minutes_, and remaining on precisely the same level, we passed from October to July. The cold lake-breeze died away, and on the little inland river the sun was actually oppressive. Seal-skins were cast aside, and we sent hastily below for sun-umbrellas. The speed of the steamer was slackened to four miles an hour. You heard no click of machinery or swash of water against the sides: we were gliding on through a green and lovely marsh, with water-lilies all about us and wild roses in the distance. Cattle stood knee-deep in pleasant brooks, locusts hummed and buzzed in the warm air, all sweet summer sounds and scents encompassed us. There was even a little settlement of scattered houses; but the expected steamer had evidently created no excitement in the inmates. It would not stop; it brought them neither mail nor summer boarder: why should they care just to see it pass? One man, painting the window-sashes of his house with his back to the steamer, never even turned or paused from his work, though we were so near that he might have heard what was said about him on the deck. It is not the dweller in the wilderness, but the denizen of cities, that longs for something to happen. At Hancock the steamer waits several hours, giving an opportunity to visit the wonderful copper-mines. We chanced to be there just at the hour to see one of the unique sights of America,--the working of the man-engine that brings the miners up from their work. Even by machinery it takes them half an hour to reach daylight. The mine is worked to the depth of fifteen hundred feet, and for five hundred we could gaze down into the dark and awful shaft, lit for us by the candles burning in the miners' caps. Two long beams, to which are attached at right angles little platforms at intervals of eight feet, each platform holding one man, work up and down. As each man reaches the level of the platform above on the opposite beam the engine stops just long enough for him to step from one to the other. The long, silent, spectral procession, moving with such shadowy precision and constant motion, with the glimmering lights changing, not fitfully, but with the regularity of well-trained will-o'-the-wisps, made a panorama not easily forgotten. Every minute or two, as the engine paused, the miner whose platform had reached the top sprang suddenly, like a jack-in-the-box, out of the opening into which we were gazing, touched his hat, and disappeared into the town. Long as we waited, the procession was not yet ended when we had to go back to the Japan.