o4 LABRADOR 
“Since 1885 the writer has made a number of trips 
through the interior and along the northern and western 
coasts, reports of which are published by the Canadian 
Geological Survey. 
“This in a few words is the available knowledge con- 
cerning the history of the vast interior of Labrador; our 
information has been wholly derived from a few portage 
routes travelled by the voyageurs of the Hudson’s Bay 
Company to and from the coast and from a few surveyed 
tracks along the principal watercourses by government 
explorers and others.” 
One quarter of the whole surface of Labrador is estimated 
to be covered with fresh water. Vast lakes are so joined 
by an intersecting network of rivers that it is possible to 
canoe over most of the country with astonishingly few 
portages of length. For example, a voyager can enter 
the Manikuagan River at the Gulf of St. Lawrence in lat. 
49° 15’ north, travel about three hundred miles to Summit 
Lake in lat. 53° north, cross the lake and on the opposite 
side enter the Koksoak River, and, proceeding another 
four hundred miles, come out in Ungava Bay in lat. 58° 5’ 
north.. These distances, it may be noted, are in the air- 
line; following the turns of the rivers the distances are 
nearly twice as great as those given. Or, again, one can 
enter Hamilton Inlet, proceed about one hundred and fifty 
miles to the mouth of Hamilton River in long. 60° west, 
follow it to its source some six hundred miles to the west- 
ward, cross by a short portage to the head of Big River, 
and follow that stream about seven hundred miles farther 
westward, to its mouth in Hudson Bay in long. 79° west. 
Probably in no country of equal area can exploration by 
canoe be carried on with so few portages. 
