Kingston to Toronto. 125 



for durability and quality. Here is situated Victoria College, 

 built by the Wesleyan Methodist body, attended by about 

 150 students. It is a fine handsome edifice, and has a good 

 high school in connection with it. Cobourg possesses one 

 of the finest town halls in Canada, containing the best pro- 

 portioned ball-room in the Province, and honored by the 

 Prince of Wales on his visit. The gaol here is also a strong, 

 massive and imposing building. 



This place has the advantage of a large and well settled 

 back country, which brings a considerable amount of busi- 

 ness to the front ; and the Cobourg & Peterboro' Railway 

 bids fair to do a large amount of business in bringing out 

 lumber, which is largely manufactured on the Otonabee 

 River and connecting waters of a chain of lakes some fifteen 

 miles north. The nearest of these to Cobourg is Rice 

 Lake, twelve miles distant, so called on account of the large 

 quantities of that grain which grow there in a wild state on 

 its banks and in its marshy edges ; this the Indians gather 

 in the fall of the year, by laying the stalks over the edges of 

 their canoes, and then beating out the grain with a rough 

 wooden mallet or billet of wood. This lake is nearly thirty 

 miles long, and only seven miles wide, well studded with 

 islands, which cause it to present a most picturesque ap- 

 pearance. The Otonabee River falls into it at the north 

 from Peterborough, and the Trent River issues from its 

 eastern extremity, falling into the Bay of Quinte, making 

 through its irregular course a length of nearly one hundred 

 miles. The Otonabee River connects it with a chain of 

 lakes still further to the north ; these as well as Rice Lake 

 and the Otonabee River are but expansions and channels of 

 the Trent itself, just as Lake St. Peter, Lake St. Francis, 

 &c, are of the St. Lawrence. The names o f the principal of 

 these lakes in the Colborne district are Trent, Shebauticon, 

 Balsam, Bobcaygcon, CJicmong, Pigeon, Sturgeon, Mud, Cam- 

 eron, and a host of other smaller ones. Describe one and 



