A JOURNEY TO THE RED RIVER 63 



pany. The former traders ultimately amalgamated with 

 the Hudson people ; but before this took place, some- 

 thing very like a pitched battle occurred between em.- 

 ployees of the rival trades, in which Mr. Semple, a 

 governor of the Hudson Company, and a number of his 

 men, were killed. The fighters were mostly half-breeds, 

 and it is said that their officers could not control them, 

 when their blood was up. 



Fort William is now a Hudson post ; but very little 

 trade in peltry is done here.'^ It is a great fish-curing 

 depot, and this trade seems now to give it all its im- 

 portance. The fish mostly caught are the ever-cele- 

 brated (in America) white fish, and large trout weighing 

 twenty or thirty pounds. These two fish are the finest 

 flavoured in this part of America ; and the trout, not- 

 withstanding their size, are not coarse, but of a delicious 

 flavour. They, as well as the white fish, are split open, 

 salted, and dried in the sun ; and thus cured sent pretty 

 well to all parts of North America. This kind of salt- 

 fish is, however, in my opinion, far inferior to the cured 

 Newfoundland cod. 



Before quitting the Great Lakes I should like to 

 remark that the rocky cliffs of the northern shores, the 

 immense expanse of the waters, and the heavy, rolling 

 character of the billows, s^ave me the feeling of beinof on 

 a sea-coast. The lakes deserve the name of, and ous-ht 

 to be called, inland seas. They are quite as much seas 

 as the Caspian, Black Sea, &c. The waters are beauti- 

 fully clear and pure ; and objects lying on the bottom 

 can be seen at a great depth ; as can also the fish swim- 

 ming in immense shoals. The bottom seems to be every- 

 where, on the north coasts at all events, either sandy or 

 rocky. 



Fort William is not worth two lines of description. 

 There is absolutely nothing attractive about the place, 



^ That is my opinion, and I must let it stand ; but it has been contra- 

 dicted. 



