28 HUNTERS OF THE GREAT NORTH 



and mountains and lakes all over Canada and in many 

 other countries. 



In the terrific humid midsummer heat I walked the 

 sandy road across rolling hills and occasionally waded 

 through small patches of swamp from the head of Smith 

 Rapids to Fort Smith which stands at the lower end. 

 The roar of the rapids could be heard through the forest 

 which hid the river. , I should have liked to see the whirl- 

 pools and waterfalls and especially the pelican rookery 

 on a little island, for this is said to be the most northerly 

 rookery of that bird in the world. But I had not as yet 

 become acclimated enough to the North to have the cour- 

 age to fight the mosquitoes through as long and tedious 

 a battle as would have been necessary had I clambered 

 my way among the boulders and through the brush along 

 the river's brink for fifteen miles. Just then nothing ap- 

 peared to me so desirable as getting quickly into a house 

 at Fort Smith where mosquito netting and closed doors 

 would shut out the insect world. 



At the Rapids we left behind our humorist, the same 

 Lee who had astounded the natives as a canoeman. His 

 job was to build the sawmill which was to produce the 

 lumber needed for the construction of a more modern 

 river steamer for service on the lower Mackenzie. In his 

 main purpose Lee succeeded well, for two years later on 

 my second journey through this country I photographed 

 the launching of the Mackenzie River, which had been 

 built in the intervening two years from the lumber cut 

 by Lee's sawmill. She has been [living regularly since 

 then up and down the magnificent 1300 mile waterway 

 that lies between the Smith Rapids and the head of the 

 Mackenzie delta well within the arctic circle. 



The Wrigley awaited us at Fort Smith. The Mid- 



