Some of these days were very
disagreeable. April rains are cold and persistent--the proverbs as
to showers were made for another latitude. Drenched garments are
bad enough when a man is moving about and has daylight; but when
night falls, and the work is over, he likes a dry place and a change
with which to comfort himself. Dry places there were none. Even
the interior of the tents became sodden by continual exits and
entrances of dripping men, while dry garments speedily dampened in
the shiftings of camp which, in the broader reaches of the lower
river, took place nearly every day. Men worked in soaked garments,
slept in damp blankets. Charlie cooked only by virtue of
persistence. The rivermen ate standing up, as close to the
sputtering, roaring fires as they could get. Always the work went
forward.
But there were other times when a golden sun rose each morning a
little earlier on a green and joyous world. The river ran blue.
Migratory birds fled busily northward--robins, flute-voiced blue-
birds, warblers of many species, sparrows of different kinds, shore
birds and ducks, the sweet-songed thrushes. Little tepid breezes
wandered up and down, warm in contrast to the faint snow-chill that
even yet lingered in the shadows.
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