Steamer Kenora, Lake of the Woods, Fort Francis to Kenora. 



flowing into Hudson Bay, through the Winnipeg river, Win- 

 nipeg lake, Nelson river to Hudson Bay. 



White fish, pike, muskelonge, sturgeon and many other 

 smaller fish are to be found. Large fisheries around the lake, 

 there being about twenty on the American side, ship large 

 consignments to the Eastern markets. 



French explorers were on the lake as early as the begin- 

 ning of the eighteenth century, and the first settlement was 

 made at Fort St. Charles, an American island, in 1722, a 

 couple of months after George Washington was born. The 

 lake is associated with stories and legends of the French and 

 Indians. American Island is the subject perhaps of the most 

 interesting of the historical facts connected with the lake. 

 It was here that La Verendrye, the French explorer, built 

 one of his forts, a rectangle consisting of four rows of fifteen 

 foot palisades "with four bastions. 



This rectangle was one hundred feet long and contained a 

 house for the missionary, a church, a house for the com- 

 mandant, an apartment building with four chimneys, a pow- 

 der house, a store house and a sentry box. Two doors opened 

 into the enclosure. From here La Verendrye's son, Jean, 



16 



