Читать книгу Arctic Searching Expedition (Sir John Richardson) - comprehensive & illustrated - (Literary Thoughts Edition) - Sir John Richardson - Страница 4

OVERLAND SEARCHING EXPEDITION.—ROUTES THROUGH THE INTERIOR.—HUDSON'S BAY SHIPS.—PEMICAN.—BOATS.—BOAT PARTY LEAVES ENGLAND.—ARRIVES AT WINTER QUARTERS.—VOLUNTEERS.—MR. JOHN RAE APPOINTED TO THE EXPEDITION.—THE AUTHOR AND MR. RAE SAIL FROM ENGLAND.—LAND AT NEW YORK.—PROCEED TO MONTREAL AND LA CHINE.—CANOE-MEN.—SAUT STE. MARIE.—VOYAGE TO THE NORTH.—REACH CUMBERLAND HOUSE.

The preceding pages contain an exposition of the objects of the expedition, with a general outline of the course to be pursued after leaving the Mackenzie; but as that great river can be attained only by a long and laborious lake and river navigation, it is proper that I should introduce the narrative by a brief account of that first stage of our overland journey. There are two routes to the Mackenzie, one of which, traced at an early period by the Canadian fur companies, passes through Lakes Huron and Superior, the Kamenistikwoya, or Dog River, the Lake of the Woods, Rainy Lake, Lake Winipeg, Cedar Lake, the Saskatchewan River, Beaver and Half-moon Lakes, Churchill or English River, Isle à la Crosse Buffalo and Methy Lakes to the Methy Portage, and the Clear-water or Little Athabasca River, one of the affluents of the Mackenzie. From thence there is a continuous water-course to the sea, through the Elk or Athabasca River, Athabasca Lake, Slave River and Lake, and the Mackenzie proper.

The length of this interior navigation from Montreal to the Arctic Sea is, in round numbers, four thousand four hundred miles, of which sixteen hundred miles are performed on the Mackenzie and its affluents, from Methy Portage northwards, and in which the only interruptions to boat navigation are a few cascades and rapids in Clear-water and Slave Rivers.

During the existence of the North-west, X-Y, and other fur companies trading from Canada, supplies were conveyed to their northern posts by the way of the Ottawa river and great Canada lakes; but they reached the distant establishments on the Mackenzie only in the second summer, having been deposited in the first year at a depôt on Rainy River. Owing to the shallowness of the streams, and badness of the portage roads over the heights between Lake Superior and Rainy Lake, the transport of goods requires to be performed in canoes, with much manual labour, and is, consequently, very expensive. On this account the Hudson's Bay Company, who are now the sole possessors of the northern fur trade, no longer take their trading goods from Canada, but send them by the shorter and cheaper way of Hudson's Bay; though they still employ two or three canoes on the Lake Superior route, to accommodate the Governor in his annual journeys from his residence at La Chine to Norway House, and for the transport of newly-hired servants to the interior, or for bringing down officers coming out on furlough, and men whose period of service has expired. No repairs having of late years been made on the portage roads, they have very much deteriorated, and are truly execrable.

The distance between York Factory in Hudson's Bay and Norway House, situated near the north-east corner of Lake Winipeg, does not much exceed three hundred miles; and as the navigation, though much interrupted by rapids and cascades, admits, in the majority of seasons, of boats carrying a cargo of between fifty and sixty hundred-weight, it offers a much more economical approach to the interior of the fur countries than the other; since one of these boats may be managed by the same crew that is required for a canoe carrying only twenty hundred-weight. The Hudson's Bay ships are generally two in number; one of them being employed in taking supplies to Moose Factory, at the bottom of James's Bay, and the other to York Factory, in latitude 57° N., longitude 92½° W., on the west coast of Hudson's Bay. They sail annually from the Thames on the first Saturday in June, and, after touching at the Orkneys, to receive labourers for the Company's service, proceed on their voyage to Hudson's Straits. The York Factory ship has dropped her anchor at the mouth of Hayes River as early as the 5th of August, and as late as the beginning of September. A tardy arrival is very inconvenient, both in respect of forwarding goods into the interior, and also with regard to the return of the ship to England, there being in such a case scarcely time for the embarkation of the cargo of furs and the passage of Hudson's Straits before the winter sets in.

This brief notice of the modes of communication with Rupert's Land—for so the possessions of the Hudson's Bay Company are named—is given, to explain some parts of the plan of the expedition, and particularly to show why the stores and men were sent out by ships which sailed in June 1847, although the expediency of searching expeditions was not considered by the Admiralty to be established until the last of the whalers came in at the close of that season, without bringing tidings of the discovery ships. It was arranged that in that case, the officers were to leave England early in 1849, and, travelling as rapidly as they could through the United States and Canada, were to overtake the party conveying the stores in the vicinity of Methy Portage.

In April, 1847, I had the advantage of a personal interview with Sir George Simpson, Governor-in-chief of Rupert's Land, who was then on a visit to England, and of concerting with him the measures necessary for the future progress of the expedition; and I may state here that he entered warmly into the projects for the relief of his old acquaintance Sir John Franklin; and from him I received the kindest personal attention, and that support which his thorough knowledge of the resources of the country and his position as Governor enabled him so effectively to bestow. He informed me that the stock of provisions at the various posts in the Hudson's Bay territories was unusually low, through the failure of the bison hunts on the Saskatchewan, and that it would be necessary to carry out pemican from this country, adequate not only to the ulterior purposes of the voyage in the Arctic Sea, but also to the support of the party during the interior navigation in 1847 and 1848. I, therefore, obtained authority from the Admiralty to manufacture, forthwith, the requisite quantity of that kind of food in Clarence Yard; and as I shall have frequent occasion to allude to it in the subsequent narrative, it may be well to describe in this place the mode of its preparation.

The round or buttock of beef of the best quality, having been cut into thin steaks, from which the fat and membranous parts were pared away, was dried in a malt kiln over an oak fire, until its moisture was entirely dissipated, and the fibre of the meat became friable. It was then ground in a malt mill, when it resembled finely grated meat. Being next mixed with nearly an equal weight of melted beef-suet or lard, the preparation of plain pemican was complete; but to render it more agreeable to the unaccustomed palate, a proportion of the best Zante currents was added to part of it, and part was sweetened with sugar. Both these kinds were much approved of in the sequel by the consumers, but more especially that to which the sugar had been added. After the ingredients were well incorporated by stirring, they were transferred to tin canisters, capable of containing 85 lbs. each; and, having been firmly rammed down and allowed to contract further by cooling, the air was completely expelled and excluded by filling the canister to the brim with melted lard, through a small hole left in the end, which was then covered with a piece of tin, and soldered up. Finally, the canister was painted and lettered according to its contents. The total quantity of pemican thus made was 17,424 lbs., at a cost of 1s. 7¼d. a pound. But the expense was somewhat greater than it would otherwise have been from the inexperience of the labourers, who required to be trained, and from the necessity of buying meat in the London market at a rate above the contract price, occasioned by the bullocks slaughtered by the contractor for the naval force at Portsmouth being inadequate to the supply of the required number of rounds. Various temporary expedients were also resorted to in drying part of the meat, the malt kiln and the whole Clarence Yard establishment being at that time fully occupied night and day in preparing flour and biscuit for the relief of the famishing population of Ireland. By the suggestions of Messrs. Davis and Grant, the intelligent chief officers of the Victualling Yard, and their constant personal superintendence, every difficulty was obviated.

As the meat in drying loses more than three fourths of its original weight, the quantity required was considerable, being 35,651 lbs.; and the sudden abstraction of more than one thousand rounds of beef from Leadenhall Market occasioned speculation among the dealers, and a rise in the price of a penny per pound, with an equally sudden fall when the extra demand was found to be very temporary.

The natives dry their venison by exposing the thin slices to the heat of the sun, on a stage, under which a small fire is kept, more for the purpose of driving away the flies by the smoke than for promoting exsiccation; and then they pound it between two stones on a bison hide. In this process the pounded meat is contaminated by a greater or smaller admixture of hair and other impurities. The fat, which is generally the suet of the bison, is added by the traders, who purchase it separately from the natives, and they complete the process by sewing up the pemican in a bag of undressed hide with the hairy side outwards. Each of these bags weighs 90 lbs. and obtains from the Canadian voyagers the designation of "un taureau." A superior pemican is produced by mixing finely powdered meat, sifted from impurities, with marrow fat, and the dried fruit of the Amelanchier.

By order of the Admiralty, four boats were built; two of them in Portsmouth Dock Yard, and two in Camper's Yard at Gosport. These boats, to fit them for river navigation, were required to be of as small a draught of water as was consistent with the power of carrying a cargo of at least two tons; to have the head and stern equally sharp, like a whale-boat, that they might be steered with a sweep oar when running rapids; and to be of as light a weight as possible, for more easy transportation across the numerous portages on the route, and especially the formidable one between Methy Lake and Clear-water River. They were also to be as good sea-boats as a compliance with the other requisites would allow. It is manifest that the invention of a form of boat possessing such various and in some respects antagonistic qualities would task the skill of the constructor, and I felt much indebted to William Rice, Esq., Assistant Master Builder of Portsmouth Yard, for the care and skill with which he worked out a successful result. The Company's boats, or barges, as they term them, are generally about 36 feet long from stem to stern-post, 8 feet wide, stoutly framed and planked, and are capable of carrying seventy packages of 90 lbs. each, with a crew of eight men. The thickness of the planks of these boats is such that they sustain with little injury a severe blow against a rock, to which they are much exposed in descending the rapids; but their weight being proportionally great, they are transported with much labour across the ordinary portages, and it is necessary to avoid this operation altogether at Methy Portage by keeping a relay of boats at each terminus. Moreover, these boats resemble the London river barges in the great rake of the stem and stern, by which they are better fitted for the descent of a rapid, but from the flatness of their floors they are leewardly and bad sea-boats.

Two of the expedition boats measured 30 feet from the fore part of the stem to the after part of the stern-post, 6 feet in breadth of beam, and 2 feet 10 inches in depth; and each of them weighed 6½ cwt., or, including fittings, masts, sails, oars, boat-hook, anchor, lockers and tools, half a ton. The other two boats measured 28 feet in length, 5 feet 6 inches in width, 2 feet 8 inches in depth; and weighed 5¼ cwt., or, with the moveable fittings and equipment, 9 cwt. They were all clinker-built of well-seasoned Norway fir planks 5/16 of an inch thick; ashen floors placed 9 inches apart; stem, stern-posts, and knees of English oak; and gunwales of rock-elm. To admit of their stowing the requisite cargo, they were necessarily very flat-floored, but screws and bolts were fitted to the kelson, by which a false keel might be readily bolted on before they reached the Arctic Sea, so as to render them more weatherly. The larger boats when quite empty drew 7¼ inches of water, and, when loaded with two tons but without a crew, 14¼ inches. They were constructed of two sizes, that the smaller might stow within the larger ones during the passage across the Atlantic.

For the voyage on the Arctic Sea, a crew of five men to each boat was considered sufficient, but for river navigation a bowman and steersman experienced in the art of running rapids were required in addition. Five seamen and fifteen sappers and miners were selected in the month of May, for the expedition, from a number of volunteers. They were all men of good physical powers, and, with one exception, bore excellent characters in their respective services. The solitary exception was one of the sappers and miners who had repeatedly appeared on the defaulters' list for drunkenness, but as he was reported to be in other respects a good and willing workman, and I knew that he would have no means of obtaining intoxicating drinks in Rupert's Land, I yielded to his request that I would allow him an opportunity of retrieving his character. Few seamen were employed, since I knew from experience that as a class they march badly, particularly when carrying a load, and the bulk of the party was composed of sappers and miners, because that corps contains a large proportion of intelligent artizans. Of the men selected, six were joiners or sawyers, and four were blacksmiths, armourers, or engineers, who could be useful for repairing the boats, working up iron, constructing the buildings of our winter residence, or making the furniture.

Every thing was ready before the appointed day; and the boats and stores, having been sent round from Portsmouth to the Thames, were embarked with the expedition men on board the "Prince of Wales" and "Westminster," bound to York Factory, the exigences of the Hudson's Bay trade of that year requiring two ships to go to that port. The stores consisted of 198 canisters of pemican, each weighing 85 lbs., 10 bags of flour, amounting in all to 8 cwt., 5 bags of sugar, weighing 4½ cwt., 2 of tea, weighing 88 lbs., 3 of chocolate, weighing 2 cwt., 10 sides of bacon, amounting to 4½ cwt., and 6 cwt. of biscuit; also 400 rounds of ball cartridge, 90 lbs. of small shot, and 120 lbs. of fine powder in 4 boat magazines. In the arm-chests and lockers of the boats, there were stowed a musket fitted with a percussion lock for each man, with a serrated bayonet that could be used as a saw; also a complete double set of tools for making or repairing a boat, a tent for each boat's crew, towing-lines, anchors, and one seine net.

Each man was provided with a Flushing jacket and trowsers, a stout blue Guernsey frock, a waterproof over-coat, and a pair of leggins. Instructions were also given that they should be furnished in winter with such moccasins and leather coats as the nature of their employment should render necessary. Could the expedition have depended on procuring supplies of provision at the Company's posts during their progress through the interior, and a sufficient quantity of pemican at one of the northern depôts for the sea voyage, the boats would have been lightly laden, and a quick advance into the interior might have been anticipated. But such not being the case, it was necessary to employ one of the Company's barges to assist in the transport; and Governor Sir George Simpson undertook to provide one, and to engage a proper crew in Rupert's Land, together with bowmen and steersmen for the expedition boats. He also agreed to select from the Company's stores a complete assortment of nets and other necessaries for the use of the party in the winter of 1847-8.

The Company's ships sailed from the Thames on the 15th of June, 1847, and, being much delayed by ice in Hudson's Straits, had a long passage; so that the "Prince of Wales" did not cross the bar of Hayes River till the 25th of August, nor the "Westminster" until five days later; and the 8th of September arrived before the expedition stores were landed. Sir George Simpson, on his annual visit to the Company's depôt at Norway House, had engaged a guide or river pilot, with the requisite number of bowmen, steersmen, and fishermen, and placed the whole under the superintendence of Mr. John Bell, chief trader, who, having resided many years on the Mackenzie, was intimately acquainted with the natives inhabiting that part of the country. Notwithstanding the high wages offered, being much in advance of the rate ordinarily paid by the Company, and though none of these men were required to extend their services beyond the winter quarters of the party in 1848, there was a scarcity of volunteers; and several of the steersmen, that were, from the necessity of the case, engaged, were men of little experience. None of them were acquainted with the neighbourhood of Great Bear Lake, and they all anticipated with more or less apprehension a season of extreme hardship in that northern region. Mr. Bell's party consisted of twenty Europeans, a guide, and sixteen Company's voyagers, together with the wives of three of the latter, and two children; making in all, with himself and two of his own children, forty-five individuals, embarked in five boats. Had the ships arrived early, there was a possibility of the party reaching Isle à la Crosse before the navigation closed, which, in that district, may be expected to occur about the 20th of October. But the very late date at which the stores were disembarked precluded such a hope; and the extreme dryness of the season, and consequent lowness of the rivers between York Factory and Lake Winipeg, obliged Mr. Bell to leave a quantity of the pemican and some other packages at York Factory, that he might reduce the draught of his boats.

These facts were communicated to me on the return of the Hudson's Bay ships to England in October; and in February, 1848, I heard by letters forwarded through Canada, that Mr. Bell and his party had, from the causes specified, made slow progress; that the boats had been often stranded and broken in the shallow waters, causing frequent detention for repairs; and that the party was overtaken by winter in Cedar Lake. Mr. Bell forthwith housed the boats, constructed a storehouse for the goods, left several men to take care of them, and such of the women and children as were unable to travel over the snow. This being done, he set out with the bulk of the party for Cumberland House, and reached it on the eighth day after leaving Cedar Lake. His first care was to establish a fishery, which he did on Beaver Lake, two days' walk further north; and having sent a division of the men thither, the others were distributed to the several winter employments of cutting fire-wood, driving sledges with meat or fish, and such-like occupations. The unforeseen stoppage of the boats occasioned a large consumption of the pemican destined for the sea voyage, but was attended by no other bad consequences, and the deficiency was amply made up in spring through the exertions of the gentlemen in charge of the Company's provision posts on the Saskatchewan; so that Mr. Bell, when he resumed his voyage northwards in the summer of 1848, was enabled to take with him as much of that kind of food as his boats could stow.

While the body of the party was thus passing the winter at Cumberland House and its vicinity, I was almost daily receiving letters from officers of various ranks in the army and navy, and from civilians of different stations in life, expressing an ardent desire for employment in the expedition. It may interest the reader to know that among the applicants, there were two clergymen, one justice of peace for a Welsh county, several country gentlemen, and some scientific foreigners, all evidently imbued with a generous love of enterprise, and a humane desire to be the means of carrying relief to a large body of their fellow creatures. But as long as there remained a hope of the return of the discovery ships in the autumn of 1847, it was not thought necessary to take any steps for the appointment of a second officer to the party which I was to command. In November, however, when the last whalers from Davis's Straits had come in, I suggested to the late Lord Auckland, then the First Lord of the Admiralty, that Mr. John Rae, chief trader of the Hudson's Bay Company, was fully qualified for the peculiar nature of the service on which we were to be employed. He had resided upwards of fifteen years in Prince Rupert's Land, was thoroughly versed in all the methods of developing and turning to advantage the natural products of the country, a skilful hunter, expert in expedients for tempering the severity of the climate, an accurate observer with the sextant and other instruments usually employed to determine the latitude and longitude, or the variations and dip of the magnetic needle, and had just brought to a successful conclusion, under circumstances of very unusual privation, an expedition of discovery fitted out by the Hudson's Bay Company, for the purpose of exploring the limits of Regent's Inlet. Lord Auckland highly approved of my suggestion, and Mr. Rae was appointed with the assent of the Governor and Committee of the Hudson's Bay Company.

Mr. Rae and I left Liverpool on the 25th of March, 1848, in the North American mail steam-packet "Hibernia," and landed at New York on the morning of the 10th of April. In addition to our personal baggage, we took with us a few very portable astronomical instruments required for determining our positions; and four pocket chronometers, one of them being the property of Mr. Frodsham, which had been used on the several expeditions of Sir W. E. Parry and Sir John Ross, and which he wished to lend gratuitously for service in the present enterprise. We had also a few meteorological instruments, and some others for determining questions in magnetism, that shall be more particularly described hereafter, when their employment comes to be mentioned. An ample supply of paper for botanical purposes, a quantity of stationery, a small selection of books, a medicine chest, a canteen, a compendious cooking apparatus, and a few tins of pemican, completed our baggage, which weighed in the aggregate, above 4000 lbs.

Mr. Barclay, the British consul, assisted with much kindness in expediting our departure from New York. An order from the United States Treasury directed that our baggage should not be inspected by the custom-house agents, and it was without delay consigned to the care of Messrs. Wells and Co., forwarders, who contracted to send it to Buffalo, by rail-road, and from thence to Detroit and Saut Sainte Marie, by the first steam-boat, which was advertised to sail from Detroit on the 21st of April. Immediately on landing, the chronometers were placed in the hands of Mr. Blount, of Water Street, that he might ascertain their rate by comparison with the astronomical clock in the observatory. For this service Mr. Blount would receive no remuneration, but, on the contrary, said that he was glad of the opportunity it afforded him of showing his sense of the courtesy he had experienced from the hydrographer of the British Admiralty.

We received the chronometers next day, and embarked in the evening on board the "Empire," for Albany and Troy, with the view of proceeding, by way of Lake Champlain, to Montreal, where the canoe-men engaged for us by Sir George Simpson were ordered to rendezvous.

We waited one day at Whitehall, for the complete disruption of the ice on Lake Champlain, and did not reach Montreal till the fourth day after leaving New York. Sir George Simpson received us, with his usual kindness and hospitality, at his residence in La Chine, and expedited our arrangements by all the means in his power; but two days were spent in collecting the voyagers who were engaged as our canoe-men. Four of them, with the levity of their class, were absent at the time finally fixed for our departure, thereby, in terms of their agreements, incurring fines, which were afterwards levied by the Hudson's Bay Company.

The steamers commenced running on the St. Lawrence on the 18th of April; we embarked on the 19th, reached Buffalo on 21st, Detroit on the 23rd, and Saut Ste. Marie, at the outlet of Lake Superior, on the 29th, where we again found ourselves in advance of the season, the Lake being covered with drift ice.

At the Hudson's Bay House, the residence of Chief Factor Ballenden, we found two "north canoes," made ready for us, by direction of Sir George Simpson, and, having engaged four additional men to supply the place of an equal number who had failed to appear at La Chine, our crews now consisted of

FIRST CANOE.

Thomas Karahonton (dit Gros Thomas), an Iroquois guide.

Laxard Tacanajazè Iroquois.

Thomas Nahanajazè „

François Monegon „

Thomas Anackera „

Sauveur St. Martin Canadian.

Thomas Cadrant Half-breed.

Joseph Dinduvant „

SECOND CANOE.

Charlot Arahota Iroquois.

Louis Taranta „

Ignace Atawackon „

Ignace Sataskatchi „

Apoquash Chippeway.

Miskiash „

Piquatchiash (Peter) „

Two days were occupied in re-packing our baggage, instruments, and provisions, in cases weighing 90 lbs. each (being the established size for the portages); in which, and in all other matters connected with our equipment and comfort, we experienced great assistance and personal kindness from Mr. Ballenden. On the 2nd of May, 1851, we quitted his hospitable roof, but it was the 4th before the ice on the lake broke up, and permitted us to pass the portal of the lake formed by Gros Cap and Point Iroquois.

We accomplished the navigation of the lake on the 12th by arriving at Fort William, attained the summit of the water-shed which separates the St. Lawrence and Winipeg valleys on the 18th, the mouth of the River Winipeg on the 29th, Norway House, near the efflux of Nelson River, on the 5th of June, and Cumberland House, on the Saskatchewan, on the 13th; our passage through Lake Winipeg having been much delayed by ice, from which we did not disengage ourselves till the 9th.

We learnt at Cumberland House, that Mr. Bell had given the boats a thorough repair at Cedar Lake in the spring, had brought them and the stores up on the first opening of the Saskatchewan, and was now a fortnight in advance of us on his way to Methy Portage. The bulk of his party had been maintained at Beaver Lake on fish, but some having wintered in Cedar Lake, to look after the stores, and the fishery there having failed, there had been an unavoidable consumption of the pemican destined for the sea-voyage. The provision posts on the upper part of the Saskatchewan had fortunately been able to replace what was consumed, and Mr. Bell had started from Cumberland House with his boats fully laden.

He had left two men of the English party behind, who were unequal to the labours of the voyage; one of them, because of an injury received in the hand early in the spring, and the other owing to a recurrence of pains in the bones, with which he had formerly been afflicted. After carefully examining these men, I decided upon sending them to York Factory by the first conveyance which offered, that they might return to England in September, in the Hudson's Bay annual ship.

Having thus briefly touched on the line of route pursued by us in a journey of two thousand eight hundred and eighty statute miles, from New York to the wintering place of the boat-party, I shall detail the events of the remainder of the voyage in form of a daily journal. To have given a full account of the country travelled through between New York and the Saskatchewan, would have swelled the work to an inconvenient size; and I must, therefore, refer the reader, who wishes to have a physical description of that part of the continent, to Sir Charles Lyell's accounts of his recent visits to the United States, to Professor Agassiz's description of Lake Superior, and to Major Long's voyage to the St. Peter's, Red River, and River Winipeg. The Appendix to the present work also contains a summary of the physical geography of North America, wherein the lake basins of the St. Lawrence and Winipeg or Saskatchewan are particularly noticed. This may be consulted by the reader before he enters upon the narrative of the voyage, and I shall give in this place a few remarks, by way of preface to the botanical and geological notices which follow in the journal.

On the bluff granitic promontories and bold acclivities which form the northern shore of Lake Superior, the forest is composed of the white spruce, balsam fir, Weymouth pine, American larch, and canoe birch, with, near the edge of the lake and on the banks of streams, that pleasant inter-mixture of mountain maple and dog-wood which imparts such a varied and rich gradation of orange and red tints to the autumnal landscape. Other trees exist, but not in sufficient numbers to give a character to the scenery. Oaks are scarce, and beech disappears to the south of the lake. The American yew, which does not rise into a tree like its European namesake, is the common underwood of the more fertile spots, where it grows under the shade to the height of three or four feet, in slender bush-like twigs. On the low sandstone islands deciduous trees, such as the poplars and maples, abound, with the nine-bark spiræa, cockspur thorns, willows, plums, cherries, and mountain-ash. When we entered the lake on the 4th of May, large accumulations of drift snow on the beaches showed the lateness of the season; none of the deciduous trees had as yet budded; and the precocious catkins of a silvery willow (Salix candida), with the humble flowers of a few Saxifrages and Uvulariæ, gave the only promises of spring.

In various parts of the lake, the gorges lying between the jutting bluffs of granite or slate are filled with deposits of sand rising in four or five successive terraces to the height of more than a hundred feet above the present surface of the water. Mr. Logan has measured some of the most remarkable, and Professor Agassiz devotes an interesting chapter to the discussion of their origin; in which he comes to the conclusion that they were formed by the waters of the lake itself, and have been raised, at various intervals, from the beach to their present levels, by the agency of the innumerable trap dikes, which cross the rocks in many directions.

Near Cape Choyyè, on the south side of Michipicoten Bay, a small gorge between two points of granite is filled, to the height of twenty-five feet above the water, with rolled stones and pebbles. These rounded stones vary in size from that of a hogshead to a hen's egg, and form a steeply shelving beach, with a flat terraced summit, the larger boulders being next the water, and the smaller pebbles highest up. As the cove is sheltered from high waves, the terrace could not be thrown up by the waters of the lake standing at their present height; nor can it be owing to the pressure of ice, since that would not graduate the pebbles.

At Michipicoten River we had a curious illustration of the agency of frost, on the outlet of the stream. During the summer, when the waters are low, the waves of the lake throw a sandy bar across the mouth of the river. In winter this bar freezes into a solid rock and closes the channel, but as the spring advances the stream acts upon it and cuts a passage. At the time of our visit, on May 7th, the river was in flood, and the bar remained hard, but was cleft by a narrow channel with precipitous sides like sandstone cliffs, and a cascade one foot high existed. This fall, which was five or six feet high when the river broke, would, we were told, entirely disappear in a few days.

The north coast of Michipicoten Bay is the boldest and most rugged of the shores of the lake, and apparently the least capable of cultivation. It rises to the height of about eight hundred feet, and for twenty-five miles comes so precipitously down to the water that there is no safe landing for a boat. On much of the crags the forest was destroyed by fire, many years ago, and with it the soil, presenting a scene of desolation and barrenness not exceeded on the frozen confines of the Arctic Sea. The few dwarf trees that cling to the crevices of the rocks, struggling, as it were, between life and death, add to the dreariness of the prospect rather than relieve it, and wreaths of drift snow lining many of the recesses, at the time when we passed, though it was in the second week of the glorious month of May, gave a most unfavourable impression of the land and its climate. Professor Agassiz has pointed out the sub-arctic character of the vegetation of Lake Superior, by a lengthened comparison with the subalpine tracts of Switzerland; but this is due to the nature of the soil, rather than to the elevation or northern position of the district; for as we advance to the north at an equal elevation above the sea, but more to the westward, so as to enter on silurian or newer deposits in the vicinity of the Lake of the Woods and Rainy River, we find cacti and forests having a more southern aspect.

The ascent to the summit of the water-shed between Lakes Superior and Winipeg, by the Kamenistikwoya River, is made by about forty portages, in which the whole or part of a canoe's lading is carried on the men's shoulders; and a greater number occur in the descent to the Winipeg. The summit of the water-shed is an uneven swampy granitic country, so much intersected in every direction by lakes that the water surface considerably exceeds that of the dry land. Its mean elevation above Lake Superior is about eight hundred feet, and the granite knolls and sand-banks, which vary its surface, do not rise more than one hundred and fifty or two hundred feet beyond that general level, though their altitude above the river valleys which surround them is occasionally greater, giving the district a hilly aspect. The highest of these eminences does not overtop Thunder Mountain and some other basalt-capped promontories on Lake Superior, and had not the silurian strata, which, judging by the patches which remain, once covered the gneiss and granitic rocks nearly to their summits, been removed, the country would have been almost level, and would have formed part of the rolling eastern slope of the continent, above whose plane the highest of the hills on Lake Superior scarcely rises. The summit of this water-shed of the St. Lawrence basin, commencing towards the Labrador coast, runs south 52° west, or about south-west half-west, at the distance of rather more than two hundred miles from the water-course, until it comes opposite to that elbow of the line of the great lakes which Lake Erie forms; it then takes a north 51° west course, or about north-west half-west, towards the north-east end of Lake Winipeg, and onwards from thence in the same direction to Coronation Gulf of the Arctic Sea. The angle at which the two arms of this extensive water-shed (but no where mountain ridge) meet between Lakes Huron and Ontario is within half a point of a right one, and the character of the surface is everywhere the same, bearing, in the ramifications and conjunctions of its narrow valleys filled with water, no distant resemblance to the fiords of the Norway coast. Such a preponderance of fresh water, coupled with the tardy melting of the ice in spring, makes a late summer, and augments the severity of the climate beyond that which is due to the northern position of the district. Though the whole tract is most unfavourable for agriculture, much of the scenery abounds in picturesque beauty. Of this we have an instance in the Thousand Islands Lake, which forms the funnel-shaped outlet of Lake Ontario. At this place the pyrogenous rocks, denuded of newer deposits, cross the river to form a junction with the lofty highlands of the northern counties of New York. The round-backed, wooded hummocks of granite which constitute the more than thousand islets of this expanse of water, are grouped into long vistas, which are alternately disclosed and shut in as we glide smoothly and rapidly among them, in one of the powerful steamers, that carry on the passenger traffic of the lakes. The inferior fertility of this granite belt has deferred the sweeping operations of the settler's axe; the few farm-steadings scattered along the shore enhance the beauty of the forest; and the eye of the traveller finds a pleasant relief in contemplating the scenery, after having dwelt on the monotonous succession of treeless clearances lower down the river. Sooner or later, however, the shores of the Lake of the Thousand Isles will be studded with the summer retreats of the wealthy citizens of the adjacent states, and the incongruities of taste will mar the fair face of nature.

On the summit of the canoe-route between Lakes Superior and Winipeg, a sheet of water, bearing the analogous appellation of Thousand Lakes, is also studded with knolls of granite, forming islets; but low mural precipices are more common there; and there is, moreover, an inter-mixture of accumulations of sand, such as are commonly found on the summit of the water-shed, along its whole range. The general scenery of this lake is similar to that of the Thousand Islands; but though the elevation above the sea does not exceed fourteen hundred feet, the voyagers say that frosts occur on its shores almost every morning throughout the summer.

Silurian strata occur on both flanks of both arms of the water-shed above spoken of, to a greater or smaller extent throughout their whole length. When we descend to Lake Winipeg we come upon epidotic slates, conglomerates, sandstones, and trap rocks, similar to those which occur on the northern acclivity of the Lake Superior basin; and after passing the straits of Lake Winipeg, we have the granite rocks on the east shore, and silurian rocks (chiefly bird's-eye limestone) on the west and north, the basin of the lake being mostly excavated in the limestone. The two formations approach nearest to each other at the straits in question, where the limestone, sandstone, epidotic slates, green quartz-rock, greenstone, gneiss, and granite, occur in the close neighbourhood of each other.

The eastern coast-line of Lake Winipeg is in general swampy, with granite knolls rising through the soil, but not to such a height as to render the scenery hilly. The pine forest skirts the shore at the distance of two or three miles, covering gently-rising lands, and the breadth of continuous lake-surface seems to be in process of diminution, in the following way. A bank of sand is first drifted up, in the line of a chain of rocks which may happen to lie across the mouth of an inlet or deep bay. Carices, balsam-poplars, and willows, speedily take root therein, and the basin which lies behind, cut off from the parent lake, is gradually converted into a marsh by the luxuriant growth of aquatic plants. The sweet gale next appears on its borders, and drift-wood, much of it rotten and comminuted, is thrown up on the exterior bank, together with some roots and stems of larger trees. The first spring storm covers these with sand, and in a few weeks the vigorous vegetation of a short but active summer binds the whole together by a network of the roots of bents and willows. Quantities of drift-sand pass before the high winds into the swamp behind, and, weighing down the flags and willow branches, prepare a fit soil for succeeding crops. During the winter of this climate, all remains fixed as the summer left it; and as the next season is far advanced before the bank thaws, little of it washes back into the water, but, on the contrary, every gale blowing from the lake brings a fresh supply of sand from the shoals which are continually forming along the shore. The floods raised by melting snows cut narrow channels through the frozen beach, by which the ponds behind are drained of their superfluous waters. As the soil gradually acquires depth, the balsam-poplars and aspens overpower the willows, which, however, continue to form a line of demarcation between the lake and the encroaching forest.

Considerable sheets of water are also cut off on the north-west side of the lake, where the bird's-eye limestone forms the whole of the coast. Very recently this corner was deeply indented by narrow, branching bays, whose outer points were limestone cliffs. Under the action of frost, the thin horizontal beds of this stone split up, crevices are formed perpendicularly, large blocks are detached, and the cliff is rapidly overthrown, soon becoming masked by its own ruins. In a season or two the slabs break into small fragments, which are tossed up by the waves across the neck of the bay into the form of narrow ridge-like beaches, from twenty to thirty feet high. Mud and vegetable matter gradually fill up the pieces of water thus secluded; a willow swamp is formed; and when the ground is somewhat consolidated, the willows are replaced by a grove of aspens. Near the First and Second Rocky Points, the various stages of this process may be inspected, from the rich alluvial flat covered with trees and bounded by cliffs that once overhung the water, to the pond recently cut off by a naked barrier of limestone, pebbles, and slabs, discharging its spring floods into the lake, by a narrow though rapid stream. In some exposed places the pressure of the ice, or power of the waves in heavy gales, has forced the limestone fragments into the woods, and heaped them round the stems of trees, some of which are dying a lingering death; while others, that have been dead for many years, testify to their former vitality, and the mode in which they have perished, by their upright stems, crowned by the decorticated and lichen-covered branches which protrude from the stony bank. The analogy between the entombment of living trees, in their erect position, to the stems of sigillariæ, which rise through different layers in the coal-measures, is obvious.

The action of the ice in pushing boulders into the woods was observed at an earlier period of our voyage, and is noticed in the following terms in my journal. "In the first part of our course through Rainy Lake we followed a rocky channel, which was in many places shallow, and varied in breadth from a mile, down to a few yards. Some long arms stretch out to the right and left of the route, and particularly one to the eastward, into which a fork of Sturgeon River is said to enter. There is considerable current in these narrows. The first expanse of water we traversed is six miles across, and the second is fully wider. They are connected by a rocky channel, on whose shores many boulders are curiously piled up eight or ten feet above the rocks on which they rest. Other boulders lie in lines among the trees near the shore. They have been thrust up, many of them very recently, by the pressure of the ice, since the channel is too narrow for the wind to raise waves powerful enough to move such stones."

The granite and gneiss which form the east shore of Lake Winipeg strike off at its north-east corner, and, passing to the north of Moose Lake, go on to Beaver Lake, where the canoe-route again touches upon them. At some distance to the westward of them the Saskatchewan, which is the principal feeder of Lake Winipeg, flows through a flat limestone country, which is full of lakes, the reticulating branches of the river, and mud-banks: it has in fact all the characters of a delta, though the divisions of the stream unite into one channel before entering the lake. This flat district extends nearly to the forks of the river, above which the prairie lands commence. Pine Island Lake, Muddy Lake, Cross Lake, and Cedar Lake, where the boats were arrested by ice in 1848, are dilatations of the Saskatchewan, and when the water rises a very few feet, the whole district is flooded; which commonly occurs on the snow melting in spring. Some way to the south lies an eminence of considerable height, named by the Crees Wapŭs-këow-watchi, and by the Canadians Basquiau. It separates Winepegoos Lake, and Red-Deer Lake and River from the bed of the Saskatchewan. I am ignorant of its geological structure, not having visited it.

With respect to the forests: The white or sweet cedar (Cupressus thyoides) disappears on the south side of Rainy Lake, within the American boundary line. The Weymouth pine, various maples, cockspur thorns, and the fern-leaved Comptonia, reach the southern slope of the Winipeg basin. Oaks extend to the islands and narrows of that lake. The elm, ash, arbor vitæ, and ash-leaved maple terminate on the banks of the Saskatchewan. The "wild rice," or Folle avoine of the voyagers and traders, grows abundantly in the district between Lakes Superior and Winipeg. This grain resembles rice in its qualities, but has a sweeter taste. Though small, it swells much in cooking, and is nourishing, but its black husk renders it uninviting in its natural state. In favourable seasons it affords sustenance to a populous tribe of Indians, but the supply is uncertain, depending greatly on the height of the waters. In harvest time the natives row their canoes among the grass, and, bending its ears over the gunwale, thresh out the grain, which separates readily. They then lay it by for use in neatly-woven rush baskets. This grass finds its northern limit on Lake Winipeg, and it is common in the western waters of the more northern of the United States; but how far south it extends, I have not been able to learn. Strachey, in his "Historie of Travaille in Virginia," speaks of a "graine called Nattowine, which groweth as bents do in meadowes. The seeds are not much unlike rice, though much smaller; these they use for a deyntie bread, buttered with deere's suet." (p. 118.) It is possible that he may refer to a smaller species (H. fluitans) of the same genus, which is known to abound in Georgia; but the seed of that could scarcely be collected in sufficient quantity. The hop plant (Humulus lupulus) reaches the south end of Lake Winipeg, and, according to Mr. Simpson, yields flowers plentifully in the Red River colony. We observed it in the autumn of 1849 growing luxuriantly on the banks of the Kamenistikwoya, and connecting the lower branches of the trees with elegant festoons of fragrant flowers. An opinion prevailed among the traders that Lord Selkirk introduced it into this neighbourhood when he took possession of the North-west Company's post of Fort William, upwards of thirty years ago; but the plant is indigenous to America, and grows abundantly in the Raton Pass, lying on the 37th parallel, at the height of eight thousand feet above the sea, as well as in many localities of the northern States. Throughout the canoe-route from Lake Superior to Lake Winipeg, no district shows such fertility as the banks of Rainy River. In autumn, especially, the various maples, oaks, sumachs, ampelopsis, cornel bushes, and other trees and shrubs whose leaves before they fall assume glowing tints of orange and red, render the woodland views equal, if not superior, to the finest that I have seen elsewhere on the American continent, from Florida northwards. Nor are showy asters, helianthi, lophanthi, gentianeæ, physostegiæ, irides, and many other gay flowers, wanting to complete the adornment of its banks.

From Saut Ste. Marie to the Saskatchewan, and the banks of Churchill River, the native inhabitants term themselves In-ninyu-wuk or Ey-thinyu-wuk, and are members of a nation which formerly extended southwards to the Delaware. That part of this widely spread people which occupies the north side of Lake Huron, the whole border of Lake Superior, and the country between it and the south end of Lake Winipeg, call themselves Ochipewa, written also Ojibbeway, or Chippeway; and the more northerly division, who name themselves Nathè-wywithin-yu, are the Crees of the traders, and Knistenaux of French writers. In a subsequent chapter I shall speak more particularly of the place which this people hold among the aboriginal nations. At present, I wish merely to point out some of the circumstances which have tended to work out a difference in the moral character of these two tribes, essentially the same people in language and manners. The Crees have now for more than twenty-six years been under the undivided control and paternal government of the Hudson's Bay Company, and are wholly dependent on them for ammunition, European clothing, and other things which have become necessaries. No spirituous liquors are distributed to them, and schoolmasters and missionaries are encouraged and aided by the Company, to introduce among them the elements of religion and civilization. One village has been established near the depôt at Norway House, and another at the Pas on the Saskatchewan, each having a church, and school-house, and a considerable space of cultivated ground. The conduct of the people is quiet and inoffensive; war is unknown in the Cree district; and the Company's officers find little difficulty in hiring the young men as occasional labourers.

The case is otherwise with the Chippeways, who live within the Company's territories. The vicinity of the rival United States Fur Company's establishments; the vigorous competition which is carried on between them and the Hudson's Bay Company, in prosecution of which spirituous liquors are dispensed by both parties liberally to the natives; and the abundance of Folle avoine on Rainy River and the River Winipeg, with the plentiful supply of sturgeon obtained from these waters, rendering the natives independent of either party, have had a demoralising effect, and neither Protestant nor Roman Catholic missionaries have been able to make any impression upon them. One party of these Indians, from whom we purchased a supply of sturgeon on Rainy River, are briefly characterised in my notes, made on the spot, as being "fat, saucy, dirty, and odorous." A Roman Catholic church, erected some years ago on the banks of the Winipeg, has been abandoned, with the clearing around it, on account of the want of success of the priest in his endeavours to convert the natives; and neither the Hudson's Bay Company nor the United States people have been able to extinguish the deadly feud existing between the Chippeways and Sioux, nor to restrain their war parties.

Very recently the Chippeways of Lake Superior, through some oversight in the Canadian government in not making arrangements with them at the proper time, organised a war party against the mining village of Mica Bay, containing more than a hundred male inhabitants. In passing through Lake Superior we were pleased with the flourishing appearance of this village, containing many nicely white-washed houses, grouped in terraces on the steep bank of the lake. The mines were worked by a company, under a grant from the Canadian legislature, who, at the same period, made many other similar grants of mining localities on the lake, without previously purchasing the Indian rights. As the game is nearly extinct on the borders of the lake, the natives subsist chiefly by the fisheries; and the vicinity of the mining establishments was likely to be beneficial to them rather than injurious, by providing a market for their fish. But when they beheld party after party of white men crowding to their lands, eager to take possession of their lots by erecting buildings, and inquisitively examining every cliff, they acquired exaggerated ideas of the value of their rocks. For two summers they descended in large bodies to Saut Ste. Marie, expecting payment, and, being disappointed, thought they were trifled with. They determined, therefore, in council, to bring matters to a crisis by expelling the aggressors, and, in the autumn of 1849, made a descent upon Mica Bay, and drove away the miners and their families. To repel this attack a regiment was ordered up from Canada, at an expense which would have paid the Indians again and again: but a small part of the force only reached Mica Bay, to find the Chippeways gone; the rest were driven back to Saut Ste. Marie by stormy weather, not without very severe suffering, leading, I have been informed, to loss of life.