DOWN THE MACKENZIE RIVER 29 



night Sun and the Grahame had both been typical river 

 steamers, flat-bottomed with shallow draft and with pad- 

 dle wheels at the stern. The Wrigley was smaller, was 

 built much like an ocean-going ship and had a screw pro- 

 peller. It was then believed by many that only a spe- 

 cially seaworthy ship with a screw propeller could safely 

 cross Slave Lake, a great body of water subject occasion- 

 ally to violent gales. There is probably some truth in 

 this view. The Wrigley could cross the lake almost at 

 will but I have heard that the more modern Mackenzie 

 River now watches for a fair opportunity and dodges 

 timorously from shelter to shelter in her dealings with 

 the lake. Flat-bottomed stern wheel steamers that look 

 above water more like a house than a ship are well enough 

 on rivers but difficult to deal with on a lake or on the 

 ocean. 



The Wrigley had berths for six passengers only. Some 

 of our fellow-travelers, such as Bishop Reeve (the Right 

 Reverend William Day Reeve) had to have stateroom 

 accommodation because of their dignity — not that the 

 Bishop himself insisted on it but merely because the rest 

 of us felt the impropriety of anything else. Others had 

 to be in the cabins for other reasons. But I was a young- 

 ster without dignity and more anxious for experiences 

 than for what is called comfort. So I used to sleep on 

 deck wherever I could and whenever I felt like it. 



The Wrigley traveled rapidly and was so well man- 

 aged that nothing special happened to us. In crossing 

 Slave Lake we were out of sight of land for some hours. 

 This gave us an impression of the vast extent of that 

 lake, which is intermediate in its size between Lake Huron 

 and Lake Erie. If the large lakes of North America are 

 arranged in order of size, I believe they are as follows: 



