156 BAIE DES CHALEUES. 



which swarms with salmon. Four miles further up the Tom 

 Kedgewick is Clearwater Brook, where there is another 

 splendid salmon pool. This river and its tributaries were 

 last year set apart by the Canadian Government for natural 

 and artificial fish-breeding. A short distance below, where 

 the Tom Kedgewick joins the Eestigouche, there are roman- 

 tic cliffs of naked granite, which descend perpendicularly 

 into an inky pool which the Indians say has no bottom ; and 

 they also say that a patriarchal salmon resides in its unknown 

 depths, " as big as one canoe," which has evaded all attempts 

 at capture for generations past. Near by is a deserted cabin 

 that once belonged to a hermit by the name of Cheyne, who 

 was drowned some years since. At the confluence of the 

 Kedgewick and the Eestigouche is a level tract of meadow- 

 land with a house inhabited the only dwelling between the 

 portage and the Patapedia. From hence the route is 

 through an unbroken forest, and a district no longer mount- 

 ainous ; but the grade is .steep and the current rapid. At 

 the mouths of many of the brooks four-pound trout can be 

 caught with anything that looks like bait. Beavers abound. 

 Beaver "cuttings" and trees that they have felled with their 

 teeth are seen at frequent intervals. The wilderness is filled 

 with moose and cariboo, lynx, and various kinds of fur-bear- 

 ing animals. Hither trappers come in winter, and return 

 in spring laden with galore of pelts. 



The portage to the Grand Eiver is some thirty miles above 

 the Tom Kedgewick. Into a thicket of densest alders which 

 disclose no opening, the canoe turns abruptly and passes into 

 a sluggish creek. This creek is deep and shallgw by turns, 

 scarcely wide enough for the canoe to pass, and as crooked as 

 a double letter S. Nowhere does it follow a straight course 

 for a dozen rods together, and it is so overgrown with bushes 

 that frequent use of the hatchet is required to force a pass- 

 age. This continues for two miles, and then the canoes are 

 hauled out, and, with the luggage, carried a mile and a half to 

 another similar creek of half the length. This leads into the 



