292 SALMONID^E. 



It has been erroneously asserted that the White-fish 

 is only found in the Lakes above the Falls, but it hardly 

 requires my testimony to having seen them taken with 

 the seine-net by hundreds in Lake Ontario, and having 

 eaten them fresh from its waters month after month. 

 This Lake in fact ranks among the most productive 

 of these fisheries, as already shown in a former chapter, 

 in which it was stated that no less than 47,000 White- 

 fish were on one occasion taken at a single haul. 



When it is remembered that it thus abounds through- 

 out the whole chain of lakes as far as Lake Winnipeg, 

 penetrating also to the mouths of the rivers emptying 

 themselves into the Arctic Sea, its importance may be 

 duly appreciated. Great quantities are taken at the 

 Rapids of Sault Ste. Marie, until lately a fishery of the 

 Chippeways, who in their frail canoes ran the fall, which 

 is about eighteen feet high, and in the eddies at its 

 foot took the fish in scoop nets ; but now, as Mr. Catlin 

 says, "it has been found by money-making men to be 

 too valuable a spot for the exclusive occupancy of the 

 savage, like hundreds of others. The poor Indian is styled 

 an intruder, and his timid bark is seen dodging about 

 in the coves for a scanty subsistence, whilst he scans 

 with envy the insatiable white man filling his barrels 

 and boats, and sending them to market to be converted 

 into money." These scoop-nets are unfortunately still 



