1909] The Ottawa Naturalist. 63 



The great stream, which forms the main boundary between 

 the provinces of Ontario and Quebec, was called in early times 

 the River of the Ottawas; but, it might have been named, also, 

 the River of the Hurons. Owing to its geographical position, it 

 offered the advantages of a direct and convenient highwav be- 

 tween the French settlements on the St. Lawrence and the Indian 

 tribes of the Great Lakes. This river, especially in the seventeenth 

 century, was traversed by Algonkins and Hurons, Frenchmen 

 and priests, following, either along its shores or at its distant 

 terminals, their varied pursuits of explorers, fur-traders, scalp- 

 hunters or ministers of the gospel. vSometimes, huge fleets of 

 canoes, bearing red embassies from the west, or white punitive 

 expeditions from the east, consignments of furs to the St. Law- 

 rence trading posts, or native supplies for the winter hunt, black 

 robed Jesuits with donnes or artisans for their western missions, 

 passed up or down this great highway; while, at other times, 

 fugitive parties, both white and red, crept along the shadow of 

 its shores to avoid some scalping-party of the ubiquitous and 

 dreaded Iroquois. 



We are thus indebted to historical testimom^ for much of our 

 knowledge of what took place on the Ottawa, since the beginning 

 of the French regime. We should now endeavor to amplify this 

 knowledge, by the accumulation of such data as may be derived 

 from the domain of archaeology. The prospects in this direction, 

 though somewhat dubious at first sight, are much impro^'ed 

 upon closer acquaintance. 



It is no great tax upon our ingenuity to discover traces of 

 the presence of French and Indians on the Ottawa, in bygone 

 times. The Indian dictum that, "water leaves no trail," applies, 

 only to the deeper parts of the stream; for the writer,' has in his 

 collection, stone tomahawks of native manufacture, together 

 with trade bullets, which were taken from the shallow shore- 

 water of this river. It is, however, in the ancient camping 

 grounds, which dot the shores of the Ottawa at frequent intervals, 

 that we should search for traces of early human occupation. As 

 the recovery of the loose leaves, which have been lost out of 

 some old story book, is necessary to complete the tale; so is the 

 interpretation of the sign language of these camp-sites, a requisite 

 for the recovery of many lost or unwritten pages of our historical 

 manuscript. 



Great care should be taken in the examination of these 

 places. The ground should be all gone over on the hands and 

 knees, as, with his nose to the ground, so to speak, one is not 

 liable to overlook anything of importance. As he is about to 

 turn up a chapter on the social and domestic life of a native 

 community, he should observe the topographical features of the 



