Gape Chidley — Port Burwell. 68 



again narrows down to four or five hundred yards. In places it 

 divides into two and sometimes three channels, forming small barren 

 islands. Its cliffy shores rise to a height of three and four hundred 

 feet, and are rugged and broken with occasional gulches, or deep 

 narrow ravines leading inland, such as the picturesque little slope 

 upon which we encamped. The whole distance through is not over 

 sixteen miles. 



In some of the narrowest places of the channel, the tide race, at 

 both ebb and flood, is over ten knots an hour, while in the event of 

 a contrary wind, it is torn into lashing rapids to such an extent 

 that no boat could venture upon it. The scenery presented on every 

 hand to one travelling through the strait, is wild and sometimes 

 thrilling. Every now and then the hill- walls of the iron-charged 

 rocks, which rise almost perpendicularly three, and occasionally four, 

 hundred feet above the water, give way to low, narrow, hidden 

 circuitous turf or bog-carpeted ravines, from which dark cavern- 

 like gulches lead every here and there to the perpetually snow- 

 capped summits above. Through these gulches, or following in their 

 precipitous and broken descent, flow pretty, white silver streams, 

 filling the air with their soft cold spray. Dashing against some 

 projecting reef and round the sharp curves, and again violently upon 

 some little islet, the sweeping tide-race breaks into the roar of a 

 cataract, while the pure white mist-mantled rivulets, leaping from 

 the lofty cliffs within the diverging valleys, mingle their sounds 

 with this roar of the greater voice, as mingle the sweet contralto 

 strains of a church choir with the deep rich melody of the sanctuary 

 congregation. Such is the channel which I assisted in discovering 

 and exploring, and which I had the honour of suggesting should be 

 called McLelan Strait. 



The physical geography and characteristics of Port Burwell, and 

 Cape Chidley, at once become matters of interest. Here we have 

 found an excellent harbour so close to the Atlantic that we 

 may expect it to become the supply point for future operations in 

 Hudson Strait. It is recognizable by the mariner in approaching it, 

 after rounding Cape Chidley, by Flat Point, and Cape William 

 Smith. Flat Point is a small island thirty feet high, and the termi- 



