394 ON THE EARLY DISCOVERIES OF THE 



or from the description of others,, giving the estimated distances and 

 directions of rivers, lakes, and portages, which the travellers followed, 

 with here and there an observation for latitude, which, when they are 

 given, I have often found to he a degree or more in error. Still, most 

 of them are interesting, as amongst the earliest records of our country, 

 and there is no doubt that, in some sections of the Province particularly, 

 some of them do give details, which appear no where in our published 

 maps, and are not to be found in the records of the Crown Lands Office. 

 This arises in a great measure from that tendency to centralization, 

 which has always characterized the French nation. If any trader or 

 missionary had penetrated into an unknown region, a description of it 

 was sure, sooner or later, to find its way to the Intendant, and by him 

 was transmitted to the Government at home ; whilst with us, if an in- 

 dividual hunter or lumberer has obtained a detailed knowledge of a 

 particular locality, he does not feel in any way bound to report it to 

 Mr. Cauchon, and he would still less think of transmitting it to Down- 

 ing-street. I have seen private charts in considerable detail, of the 

 country between the Ottawa and Lake Huron, where our published 

 maps present nothing but a blank ; and I myself, nearly twenty years 

 ago, made a map, from my own knowledge and the descriptions of hun- 

 ters and others, of several chains of lakes, forming the head waters of 

 the River Trent, which are still only partially laid down with any cor- 

 rectness, partly by Mr. Murray, of the Geological Survey, and partly 

 from some exploratory lines run last year by order of the Crown 

 Lands Department. All such rough plans have the same distinguish- 

 ing feature, that the distances are very much exaggerated, especially 

 the portages ; for, when you have a heavy pack or a canoe on your 

 shoulders, a mile assumes very formidable proportions. The same 

 thing is observable in these French maps. The latest discovery gene- 

 rally is unnaturally enlarged, and though the easy observation for 

 latitude keeps the distances from north to south within reasonable 

 bounds, those from east to west, where there is no such check, attain 

 very exaggerated proportions. 



But it is not for the geographical information to be obtained from 

 them, so much as for their historical interest, that I propose introdu- 

 cing these maps to the Institute. It must, however, be confessed that 

 there is a great drawback to their value in this point of view, in the 

 fact that some of them bear no date, nor is there any record accompa- 

 nying them of the source from which they were obtained ; but many of 

 them possess internal evidence of their origin, and of the period to 

 which they relate ; and I have selected for copying, those which are of 

 the most general interest, especially for us Upper Canadians, which I 



