230 JOURNEY TO THE SHORES 
explored. An intricate channel, with four siiall 
portages, conducted us to the Woody Lake. Its 
borders were, indeed, walls of pines, hiding the 
face of steep and high rocks ; and we wandered 
in-search of a landing-place till ten P.M.; when 
we were forced to take shelter from an impend- 
ing storm, on a small island, where we wedged 
ourselves between the trees. But though we se- 
cured the canoes, we incurred a personal evil of 
much greater magnitude, in the torments inflicted 
by the musquitoes, a plague which had grown 
upon us since our departure from Cumberland 
House, and which infested us during the whole 
summer; we found no relief from their attacks 
by exposing ourselves to the utmost violence of 
the wind and rain. Our last resource was to 
plunge ourselves in the water, and from this un- 
comfortable situation we gladly escaped at day- 
light, and hoisted our sails. 
The Woody Lake is thirteen miles in length, 
and a small grassy channel at: its north-western 
extremity, leads to the Frog Portage, the source 
of the waters descending by Beaver Lake to the 
Saskatchawan.’ The distance to the Missinippi, 
or Churchill River, is only thrée hundred and 
eighty yards ; and as its course crosses the height 
nearly at right angles to the direction of the Great 
ver, it would be superfluous to compute the 
