i8gg-'oo transactions 71 



On the other hand, to the North, along the upper course of 

 the St. Charles, lies a strip of level but rather poor, sandy soil, 

 and the country then merges into a vast mountainous tract which 

 extends to Hudson Bay and the Atlantic Ocean, interrupted only 

 by the valley of the Saguenay and Ivake St. John. That North 

 L,aurentian mountainous region presents a succession of rocky, 

 rounded summits, cut by narrow valleys, with sparse, limited 

 areas of shallow soil ; a land well adapted for the production of 

 fine timber, especially for the growth of the coniferse, and origin- 

 ally an unexcelled thriving ground for the fur-bearing animals, 

 but over the greater part of its extent offering little inducement 

 to agricultural settlers, who only of late years have taken a foot- 

 hold within its borders. 



If we compare the geographical position of our Lorette 

 Hurons with that occupied b}^ their ancestors in the vicinity of 

 Lake Simcoe, during the first half of the seventeenth century, we 

 cannot fail to notice their close similarity. Although separated 

 from East to West by an interval of nearly 400 miles, and thoiigh 

 the one is 150 miles (2 degrees) to the South of the other, both 

 points lie alike at the very edge of that same lyaurentian forma- 

 tion, betwixt mountain and plain, with a vast natural hunting 

 ground on the one side, and deep soils inviting tillage on the 

 other. 



Neither is this to be looked upon as a mere coincidence. 

 Such a position would commend itself to people of the Huron- 

 Iroquois type, relying for their maintenance, on the produce of 

 the chase and, in about equal measure, on that of a rude, primitive 

 agriculture. 



If we glance at the map here given, we will observe that 

 while the various groups of that stock had their fixed abodes 

 within the champaign region bordering on the Great Lakes, none 

 was ver}^ far distant from mountainous tracts, some of which even 

 up to this day, have remained typical breeding grounds for wild 

 animals. Two instances are particularly striking : (i) Next to 

 the ancient habitat of the Hurons, that sportsman's resort of to- 

 day, the Muskoka and Parry Sound country ; and (2) close to 

 the old Mohawk settlements, the famed Adirondacks, the one 

 and the other resting on the rugged Laurentian formation. 



It may be broadly stated that the champaign region is made 



