Now and then the men laid down their loads and hewed a few of the still standing trunks, letting them fall to serve as rude bridges where the morass was almost impassable, but the real struggle began when they went back for the canoe. At first they managed to carry her on their shoulders, wading in the bog, but afterward she must be dragged through or over innumerable tangles of small fallen trunks and networks of rotten branches that had to be laboriously smashed. It was heroic labor--sometimes they spent an hour making sixty yards--and Lisle's face grew anxious as well as determined. Game had been very scarce; the deer would not last them long; and disastrous results might follow a continuance of their present slow progress. When, utterly worn out, they made camp on slightly firmer ground toward four o'clock in the afternoon, Lisle strode off heavily toward the bordering hills, while Jake pushed on to prospect ahead. Nasmyth, who was quite unable to accompany either, prepared the supper and awaited their reports with some anxiety. Lisle came back first and shook his head when Nasmyth asked if he had found a better route on higher ground. "Not a slope we could haul along," he reported. "That way's impracticable." It was nearly dark when Jake came in. "It's not too bad ahead," he informed them. They were not greatly reassured, because Jake's idea of what was really bad was alarming. Nasmyth glanced at his companion with a smile. "Is it any better than this?" he asked. "A little," answered Jake. "An old trail runs in." "Gladwyne's trail?" exclaimed Nasmyth. "The one we're looking for?" "Why, yes," drawled Jake, as if it were scarcely worth mentioning. "I guess it is." Nasmyth turned to Lisle. "I was lucky when I lighted on you as a companion for this trip. You have been right in your predictions all along, and now you're only out in striking the trail a day before you expected." "I know the bush," returned Lisle. "It's been pretty easy so far--but, for several reasons, I wish the next week or two were over." Nasmyth looked troubled. One could have imagined that misgivings which did not concern his personal safety were creeping into his mind. "So do I," he confessed, and turning toward the fire he busied himself with Jake's supper.