THE HAMILTON RIVER AND THE GRAND FALLS 157 



with small trees, chiefly black spruce, along with larch and 

 balsam fir. Lake Attikonak is upwards of forty miles long, 

 and is so covered with islands that no idea of its shape or 

 width is obtained by a passage through it. Its water is 

 clear but brownish, and does not appear to be very deep. 



The Ashuanipi, or main branch of the Hamilton, enters 

 Sandgirt Lake on its west side. The river flows from the 

 northwest for seventy-five miles in a wide valley, broken 

 by long ridges, which cut the stream into a perfect labyrinth 

 of channels connecting irregularly shaped lake expansions. 

 An intelligent detailed description of the watery maze is 

 almost impossible, and would be too long for the present 

 chapter. A few miles above Sandgirt Lake the granites 

 and gneisses give place to bedded sandstones, limestones, 

 and shales, with which are associated bedded iron ores. 

 These rocks have a remarkably close resemblance to the 

 iron formations of the south and west of Lake Superior, 

 and there is reason to believe that, in the future, important 

 deposits of iron ore will be found along the upper Hamilton 

 River. A change in the physical features follows the change 

 in the rocks; the rocky hills become higher and sharper, 

 while the ridges are longer and much less broken, causing 

 the valley to be walled in between rocky barriers that rise 

 from three hundred feet to five hundred feet above its 

 surface. 



With the change of soil there is a surprising change in 

 the trees. These increase in size; and the monotonous 

 forest of small black spruce gives place to a more diversified 

 one of white and black spruce, balsam fir, larch, balsam, 

 aspen, poplar, and white birch, all growing in the valley and 

 on the sides of the hills. This portion of the river is a 



