ears, as you plow through drifts, and scale the “bump” with a flying leap, for most of the
sliding in Ontario is done on snow which, though spicy enough in itself, is not nearly the
fun which one can get out of it in the Lower Province, where they turn a hose on at the
top of the shute[sic] until the entire track is veneered with a thin stream of water which
congeals in ice almost instantly in an atmosphere that often drops to thirty degrees below
zero, and over this crystal track I have bounded more than once at the rate of a mile in
thirty seconds.

Like all other winter sports, tobogganing is seen to perfection in Montreal. The slides are
owned and managed by the respective snowshoe clubs, and each endeavors to rival each in
speed, accommodation and hospitality. At carnival time the slides are a sight worth
crossing the continent to see. One fete I attended, the Montreal Club had a slide well-nigh
perpendicular, the decent[sic] of which came nearer making my hair stand on end than
anything I ever experienced, for it is constructed by nature, and, like all her works,
transcends the most cunning artifice of man. Down the long, steep slopes of Mount Royal,
that lifts its huge bulk behind the [ ]ous old F rench-Canadian city, the two gleaming
tracks of ice look like silver[ ] suspended in mid-air, with a gray cobwebby something,
winding up alongside, which a nearer view reveals to be a staircase. This and a few yards
of particularly abrupt “shute”[sic] are the only artificial adjuncts required to perfect the
most precipitous slide in Canada. The double tracks are separated by a ridge of ice, a little
above a foot in hight[sic], so that two toboggans can with safety race each other, from
start to finish, a distance of three-quarters of a mile, at the end of which you are quite
willing to dismount, considering the fact that the atmosphere always tarries at zero or
thereabouts, and your mad flight through such air leaves you as nearly frozen solid as
humanity can be and yet live.

The first trip I took on this slide was a revelation to me as far as sport and speed are
concerned. It was “opening night” in carnival week, and the blaze of light and color, from
summit to base, were dazzling enough to be blinding, even a mile distant. At the top of the
slide a gigantic cord-wood bonfire seemed to lick the very heavens with its flames,
supplemented every three minutes with a burst of red, green and orange lime-lights. At
intervals of every twenty feet along shute[sic], dip and far level [ ] were stretched lines
of Chinese lanterns overhead, and between these rows of light stood seemingly frost-proof
men, wielding Roman candles and rockets, and themselves costumed in the regulation
blanket suit, with brilliant sashes and stockings and torches aflame on their toques.

Throngs of merrymakers crowded the stairs and encircled the bonfire, chattering
vivaciously in French and English, laughing, jesting, trifling, and all awaiting with utmost
good humor their turn at the slide, down which every second or two whizzed a daring
little craft with its light-hearted crew, that disappeared for an instant under the first dip,
arose on the second, vanished again, then slipped straight and swift adown the long,
narrow path, out of sight. Before us stood seventy-nine people, by actual count, all with
toboggans upturned on the stern end to make room for those behind them--never an
impatient word, never a jostle, never a pushing to get ahead or a rude, ungallant word. In
all my life I have never witnessed such a brilliant and well-bred throng. The gorgeously-