130 THE GREAT NORTH-WEST 



was floating along at a swinging rate, and according to my 

 companions would make navigation exceedingly dangerous. 

 But I showed a will of my own on this occasion, and 

 insisted on a start. A pretty start it proved. We had 

 scarcely got the canoe launched and loaded, and pushed 

 off from the shore before over we went into the water, 

 goods and all. " I told you so ! " said Achil, but the 

 Indian took the accident quite coolly. However, we had 

 to go back to the hut and dry ourselves and our be- 

 longings, and the start was postponed till the following 

 day. 



We got fairly away on the 16th and began our 

 voyage on the Severn on the 17th April. The dis- 

 tance to the fort was about 230 miles, the river being 

 in reality a chain of lakes, some of them of consider- 

 able size, and nearly all of most picturesque appearance, 

 being buried in the heart of a great forest. 



The journey was a trying experience, as one of us 

 had to constantly ward off the floating blocks of ice, 

 which were heavy enough to have smashed in the side 

 of the canoe. In the lakes we had not this difficulty to 

 contend with as the ice had mostly drifted into the 

 banks. Both river and lakes were rather shallow ; but 

 in the former there are a number of what geologists call 

 pot-holes deep pits in the bed caused, it is said, by 

 the current whirling round heavy stones or fragments 

 of rock. 



There are several troublesome portages on the Severn, 

 as well as dangerous rapids, which, however, we ventured 

 to shoot, in spite of the blocks of ice which went down 

 with us, and a collision with which would have been 

 inevitably fatal. The Severn is connected, with other 

 streams and a chain of small lakes, with the Albany, 

 which enters James Bay to the eastward, thus forming a 

 large island, three hundred miles across in every direction, 

 in which there are half-a-dozen streams of the magnitude 

 of rivers, and many lakes. 



