An Expedition down the Begh-ula. 45 



passed the same day. On the 28th another succession of 

 more formidable rapids flowing over a rocky bottom were 

 met, and next day we encountered several more, and at one 

 part also, where the banks were high and perpendicular, a 

 portage was rendered necessary. The breadth of the river 

 in the intervals between each succession of rapids varied 

 from a fifth to half a mile, but contracted considerably 

 where these rapids occurred, in some instances being less than 

 100 yards. The banks were now high and tolerably wooded, 

 and the country had a flat appearance, occasionally 

 diversified by low ridges of rising ground. The rapids 

 generally occurred where the course of the river assumed a 

 south-westerly tendency. Ice was still in large quantities 

 along the beach, rendering the tracking anything but good. 

 Our canoe also delayed us very much, it being so frail and 

 leaky as to require repairs several times a day. 



In general, the banks of the river, where no rapids 

 occurred, were composed of clay mixed with sand and frag, 

 mentary rock ; but along and in the vicinity of rapids the 

 formation was limestone containing fossils, frequently rest- 

 ing on a bed of harder rock, and often overlaid by a stratum 

 of blue slaty-marl or clay-slate and a species of pudding-stone 

 or "soft sandstone. A few boulders were also passed as well 

 as a small sulphur spring. 



On the 1st July we encamped at the foot of a long 

 succession of rapids, being the first seen since the afternoon 

 of the preceding day, where we shot a moose-deer. A 

 portage of two miles was made next morning and the mouth 

 of a small river coming from the south-east passed. Late in 

 the evening we encamped at the foot of a defile of high per- 

 pendicular rocks through which the water flows with great 

 velocity, forming numerous rapids, some of them rather 

 formidable. The river here is about 30 yards wide. A 

 portage of six miles had therefore to be made the following 

 morning (the 3rd). I have called this defile the Lower 

 Ramparts on account of its resemblance to the Ramparts 

 near Good Hope on the Mackenzie. Shortly afterwards we 



