﻿1848. POISONOUS PLANTS. 95 



Portage of three hundred paces made over mica- 

 slate. The beach there is strewed with fragments 

 of a crystalline augitic greenstone, showing that 

 that rock is not far distant. 



From a party of Chepewyans who were encamped 

 on the Otter Lake, we procured a quantity of a 

 small white root, about the thickness of a goose 

 quill, which had an agreeable nutty flavour. I 

 ascertained that it was the root of the Sium lineare. 

 The poisonous roots of Cicuta virosa. maculata, and 

 hidbifera, are often mistaken for the edible one, and 

 have proved fatal to several labourers in the Com- 

 pany's service. The natives distinguish the proper 

 kind by the last year's stem, which has the rays of 

 its umbel ribbed or angled, while the Cicutce have 

 round and smooth flower-stalks. When the plant 

 has put out its leaves, by which it is most easily 

 identified, the roots lose their crispness and become 

 woody. The edible root is named ilskotask by the 

 Crees, and queue de rat by the Canadians. The 

 poisonous kinds are called manito-skatash^ and by 

 the voyagers carrotte de Moreau, after a man wlio 

 died from eating them. 



The HeucJiera Eichardsomi, which abounds on the 

 rocks of this river, is one of the native medicines, 

 its astringent root being chewed and applied as a 

 vulnerary to wounds and sores. Its Cree name is 

 piche quaow-utchepi. The leaves of the Ledum 



