276 CANADIAN NIGHTS 



icy bolt drawn across the door, barring the way. 

 Lake Winnipeg is a huge lake, an inland sea of 

 some three hundred miles in length and fifty or 

 sixty in breadth. It receives the drainage of the 

 fertile belt through navigable rivers, and it sends 

 off that drainage towards the North through a 

 large river — the Nelson — which pours its waters 

 into Hudson's Bay. The Nelson is, in fact, the 

 continuation of the Saskatchewan. Lake Winnipeg 

 is in the very centre of the continent. If ocean 

 steamers could penetrate to that lake, it would be 

 like despatching a steamer direct from the port of 

 London to the grain elevators of Chicago. It 

 would be even better, for a vessel loading in Lake 

 Winnipeg could take in her grain at the mouth of 

 rivers penetrating to the very base of the Rocky 

 Mountains, navigable for a thousand miles through 

 the richest land of the continent. Cannot this 

 magnificent water system be utilised ? I fear not. 

 There are two obstacles which I am afraid will 

 prove insurmountable. These are, the navigation 

 of Hudson's Straits, and the navigation of the 

 Nelson. Of Hudson's Bay and Straits we can 

 speak with some confidence, for the Hudson's Bay 

 Company have for a long period sent two, and 

 occasionally three, ships every year to their two 



