LAKE GARRY. 351 



to the north ; and though doubtful if the river 

 would be in that quarter or more to the eastward, 

 I stood over for it, as the inclination of a line of 

 sand-hills rather favoured the former opinion. 

 With a little difficulty we succeeded in reaching 

 a lane, which ultimately led us to the main 

 land, against whose rocky sides the ice again 

 abutted. A portage was immediately made, and 

 the boat lifted over into the water. In ten 

 minutes we were again stopped by ice, so thick 

 that all our endeavours to cut a passage with 

 the axes, and break it as had been hitherto 

 done, were utterly in vain. Another place, 

 which seemed to offer fewer obstacles, was tried 

 with the same result ; we therefore, landed and 

 made a second portage across the rocks, which 

 brought us to a sheet of water terminating in a 

 rapid ; and this, though seldom a pleasing object 

 to those who have to go down it, was now joy- 

 fully hailed by us as the end of a lake which had 

 occasioned us so much trouble and delay. In 

 summer, however, or, more properly speaking, 

 autumn, this lake must be a splendid sheet of 

 water; wherefore, regarding it apart from the 

 vexations which it had caused me, I bestowed 

 upon it the name of Lake Garry, after Nicholas 

 Garry, Esq., of the Hudson's Bay Company, to 

 whose disinterested zeal in the cause of polar 



