370 Oerieral Description of Lake EHe. 



the same island ; and the Western Sister is 14 miles west from 

 it, and two-thirds of a mile long*. 



Excepting Point Peld Island, and the Eastern Sisters^ these 

 islands are high and rocky. They are uninhabited, except by 

 runaway slaves, or outlaws for a season. 



Of the two islands mentioned as being in the eastern part of 

 the lake, one is in the bay formed by Long and Turkey Point, 

 near Point Pottohawk : it is small. The other is, as far as I 

 can learn, unnoticed by any chart or by any writer. It is close 

 to the north shore two and a half to three miles east of the 

 Ouse or Grand River, and is called " Gull Island." It is low, 

 floored on limestone, indifferently wooded, and about one-third 

 of a mile long. 



Of the rivers entering Lake Erie, the Detroit (to be described 

 elsewhere) is the largest. On the north shore, from this river 

 to Orfordness, the vicinity of the Thames and of St. Clair ren- 

 ders them few and of insignificant size. From Orfordness they 

 continue to be small as far as Catfish and other creeks, east of 

 Port Talbot ; the interval between the Thames and Lake Erie 

 being there much increased. Otter Creek is of considerable 

 magnitude, and navigable for 40 miles by boats of 20 tons bur- 

 then {Gourlay^s Reports) ; but its utility is diminished by the ex- 

 treme shallowness of its mouth. The largest river on the north 

 shore, next to the Detroit, is the Ouse, 35 miles from the north-" 

 east end of the lake. The British have a naval establishment 

 at its mouth, but now consisting of log houses for a few soldiers 

 and sailors, and the rotting hulls of one or two schooners. It 

 discharges a reddish water, and is about 200 yards wide at its 

 mouth, with a sand-bar of five feet water. It rises 80 or 90 

 miles (direct) in the north, in unsurveyed woods, and in the re- 

 mote township of Garafraxa, where it is not far from the streams 

 belonging to Lake Simcoe. The country it passes through is 

 low, but fertile in the extreme, and possesses, sixty miles from 

 the lake, some flourishing settlements. 



The principal rivers of the south shore are the Maumee, San- 

 dusky, Cuyahoga, Grand River, and Buffaloe Creek. As they 

 are not involved in geological details, and as they have been 



* These admeasurements are taken from the maps of the British and 

 American Boundary Commission. 



