234 EXPEDITION TO TUB 



sand cherry, red and black cherry, pca-vinc, gooseberry, 

 currant, bear-berry, &c. &c. 



Above the Lake of the Woods, Rainy river becomes the 

 channel of communication, and extends one hundred miles 

 to the lake of the same name. It has an average breadth 

 of about three hundred yards, is deep and gentle, and has no 

 obstructions to its navigation, within forty-eight miles of its 

 mouth ; at this distance are situated the rapids of Rainy river, 

 which are about one mile long, and have an aggregate des- 

 cent of about ten feet. About ten miles further up is an- 

 other inconsiderable rapid, with a fall of three feet. At 

 the outlet of Rainy Lake is a rapid of about five feet des- 

 cent, and two miles and a half below are the Falls of Rainy 

 river, down which the torrent pours with terrific grandeur 

 through an aggregate descent of twenty-five feet in the 

 distance of but a few yards. At this place are situated an es- 

 tablishment of the Hudson's Bay Company on the north 

 side of the river, and one belonging to the American Fur 

 Company on the south. Twenty miles below the falls is 

 the entrance of a considerable tributary from the south- 

 west called the Grand Fork, which affords a channel of 

 communication between the principal and Little Winne- 

 peek Lake of the Mississippi, navigable in wet seasons. It 

 receives several other streams of less note. Between the 

 Lake of the Woods and Rainy Lake there is another water 

 route which is sometimes travelled ; it is delineated on the 

 map as the back route. 



The contrast between the country of Rainy river and 

 that before described is no less striking than that between 

 the two water-courses themselves. Here bottoms and table 

 lands of considerable extent are often to be met with, 

 wearing the aspect of a secondary region ; these are, how- 

 ever, generally terminated, at no great distance, by tracts 



