90 
"Juneioth. Heavy t thaw, with water on the ice of the lakes. 
Made about 4 miles on small lakes, with short portages between. Wood 
is very scarce at this camp, and we can only find a few dry roots on 
spots where the snow is off the ground. The same bleak country. 
Red and gray granite rocks and ledges everywhere. 
"June nth. Travelled about five miles in an easterly direction, on 
a long, narrow, winding lake. The hills are a good deal higher to-day, 
with rougher abrupt bluffs and broken rocks. Leaving the lake we 
made a small portage, and camped below a bank of fine sand of a red 
colour, on the edge of another lake at the end of the little rocks. This 
is on Stewart and Anderson's route, where they canoed it to the Great 
Fish River. The bank of sand on which we are now camped extends 
for a couple of miles, and is perhaps half a mile in width. It is quite 
a pleasant sight after the monotonous rocks. It is formed into ridges, 
mounds and hollows like its rocky neighborhood, and bears a few small 
stunted pines here and there." 
Owing to the thaw the water from the melting snow had so ac- 
cumulated on the lakes, that the party were obliged to wait until the ice 
and snow had so loosened as to rise above this. The snowshoes were 
no longer needed, and consequently had been abandoned. Four days 
were lost on this account, and on June 15th a start was made again, but 
the travelling was very bad, only about 5 miles being the progress for 
the day. The lake, from their account, would be about 15 miles in 
length, with many rocky islands and points. Good whitefish reported 
in it, though the party did not set any nets. 
June 1 7th. "Started in the morning and travelled 8 or 9 miles to 
the north eastern end of the lake, and made a portage of about a mile, 
camping half way on it on account of the scarcity of wood. Here there 
are only bushes of stunted pines ; the largest is not a yard in height. 
They are of a considerable size at the base, from which the branches 
spring ; the whole is bent and crooked in every imaginable position, 
and generally dry at the top. 
fune [8. Finished the portage, and travelled on a narrow lake 
about 5 miles, to where a little river joins it with the next lake in our 
route. The ice in it we found had gone, so we had to make a portage 
of about a mile and a half over the hills. 
