SAINT LAWRENCE RIVER 



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SAINT LAWRENCE RIVER 



way of Belle Isle Strait, between Newfound- 

 land and Quebec, the voyage to Liverpool is 

 2,633 nautical miles, while from New York it 

 is 3,034 nautical miles. The gulf enters the sea 

 by two other deep channels; these are Cabot 

 Strait, over sixty miles wide and the largest 

 outlet, between Cape Breton and Newfound- 

 land, and Canso Strait, separating Cape Breton 

 and Nova Scotia. 



The gulf is crossed by cables, and many 

 steamers ply between Quebec and the Mari- 

 time Provinces. The tides are low, but the 

 changing currents, dense fogs and floating ice 

 often endanger shipping. Besides Prince Ed- 

 ward Island in the south and Anticosti Island 

 near the mouth of the Saint Lawrence River, 

 there are several clusters of smaller islands, es- 

 iy in the southern part of the gulf, and 

 tiny islets fringe the bold and rocky northern 

 shores. The large cod, herring, mackerel and 

 smelt fisheries of the gulf have been the chief 

 means of livelihood to a large part of the popu- 

 lation of these islands and the mainland coast. 

 % The gulf and river of Saint Lawrence were 

 discovered by Jacques Cartier. On his second 

 voyage, in 1536, he entered a bay on the north 

 coast of the gulf on the tenth of August, the 

 feast day of Saint Lawrence, and called it the 

 Bay Sainct Laurens. This name gradually be- 

 gan to designate the entire gulf and river. 



SAINT LAWRENCE RIVER, a majestic 

 stream which, with its tributaries, drains the 

 basin of the Great Lakes and the southeastern 

 part of Canada. Its basin exceeds 500,000 

 square miles in area and includes the largest 

 body of fresh water in the world. The Saint 

 Lawrence is the largest river of Canada, and 

 one of the largest rivers of the world; some 

 authorities estimate that in the volume of water 

 discharged it is second only to the Amazon. 

 The river begins at the outlet of Lake Ontario, 

 whence it flows in a northeasterly direction 

 until it enters the Gulf of Saint Lawrence, 

 about 750 miles distant. The original source 

 of this vast river system, however, is the Saint 

 Louis River, which rises in the northeastern 

 part of Minnesota and enters Lake Superior at 

 Duluth. The Saint Mary's River joins Lake 

 Superior to Lake Huron, the Saint Clair and 

 Detroit rivers connect lakes Huron and Erie, 

 and "the waters of Niagara shake the earth" 

 between Erie and Ontario. It has been well 

 said of the Saint Lawrence 



"The Great Lakes are its camping grounds, 

 where its hosts repose under the sun and stars in 

 areas like those of states and kingdoms." 



The chief tributaries from the north are the 

 Ottawa, whose dark flood enters the clear waters 

 of the main stream at the island of Montreal; 

 the Saint Maurice, noted for its high falls; 

 the Montmorency, famed for its cascade, and 

 the Saguenay, equaled by no other American 

 river east of the Rocky Mountains in the 

 grandeur of its scenery. From the south the 

 Saint Lawrence receives the Saint Regis, whose 

 sources are in the foothills of the Adirondacks ; 

 the Richelieu, the outlet of Lake Champlain; 

 the Chaudiere, whose beauty attracts many vis- 

 itors, and a number of other streams of less 

 importance. 



General Description. The average width of 

 the Saint Lawrence from Lake Ontario to Que- 

 bec is one and one-fourth miles. In some 

 places it narrows to less than a mile, but in 

 several places there are broad expanses form- 

 ing "lakes." Lake Saint Francis, thirty miles 

 above Montreal and twenty-eight miles long, 

 and Lake Saint Peter, twenty miles long and 

 about midway between Montreal and Quebec, 

 are the most important of these. Below Que- 

 bec the channel begins to broaden into the 

 great estuary that blends with the Gulf at 

 Anticosti Island. Nowhere below the Isle of 

 Orleans is the channel less than ten miles wide. 

 At the Saguenay it has a width of twenty-five 

 miles, and opposite Gaspe the distance from 

 shore to shore is fifty miles. 



The Great Lakes are settling basins for the 

 streams flowing into them, and consequently 

 the waters of the Saint Lawrence are remark- 

 ably clear and pure. There is an abundant 

 rainfall over the entire basin, but owing to the 

 equalizing effect of the lakes, whose level 

 changes but little during the year, the river is 

 not subject to sudden rises, and disastrous 

 floods along its course, with the exception of 

 occasional overflows in the spring due to the 

 obstruction of the channel by ice, are unknown. 



The fall from Lake Ontario to Quebec is 240 

 feet. Most of this is above Montreal, and be- 

 tween the lake and that city there are a num- 

 ber of rapids, whose total length is about thirty 

 miles. The tide ascends the river as far as the 

 Saint Maurice, where at spring tide the water 

 may rise eighteen feet. The rise at Quebec is 

 twenty-five feet. 



From Lake Ontario to Quebec the Saint Law- 

 rence flows through a region of low hills and 

 fertile plains. Its valley is broad and beauti- 

 ful, with now and then an isolated peak of the 

 Laurentian or the Green mountains to break 

 the monotony of the sky line. The elevation 



