A General History of the Fur Trade. 39 



Portage la Croix is six hundred paces long : to the next 

 portage is a quarter of a mile, and its length is forty paces ; 

 the river winding four miles to Vermillion Lake, which 

 runs six or seven miles North-North- West, and by a nar- 

 row strait communicates with Lake Namaycan, which takes 

 its name from a particular place at the foot of a fall, where 

 the natives spear sturgeon : Its course is about North- 

 North-West and South-South-East, with a bay running 

 East, that gives it the form of a triangle : its length is 

 about sixteen miles to the Nouvelle Portage. The discharge 

 of the lake is from a bay on the left, and the portage one 

 hundred and eighty paces, to which succeeds a very small 

 river, from whence there is but a short distance to the next 

 Nouvelle Portage, three hundred and twenty paces long. 

 It is then necessary to embark on a swamp, or overflowed 

 country, where wild rice grows in great abundance. There 

 is a channel or small river in the centre of this swamp, 

 which is kept with difficulty, and runs South and North one 

 mile and a half. With deepening water, the course conti- 

 nues North- North- West one mile to the Chaudiere Por- 

 tage, which is caused by the discharge of the waters run- 

 ning on the left of the road from Lake Naymaycan, which 

 used to be the common route, but that which I have describ- 

 ed is the safest as well as the shortest. From hence there 

 is some current though the water is wide spread, and its 

 course about North by West three miles and a half to the 

 Lac de la Pluie, which lies nearly East and West; from 

 thence about fifteen miles is a narrow strait that divides the 

 lake into two unequal parts, from whence to its discharge is 

 a distance of twenty-four miles. There is a deep bay run- 

 ning North- West on the right, that is not included, and is 

 remarkable for furnishing the natives with a kind of soft, red 

 stone, of which they make their pipes ; it also affords an 

 excellent fishery both in summer and winter; and from it is 

 an easy, safe, and short road to the Lake du Bois, (which I 

 shall mention presently) for the Indians to pass in their 

 small canoes, through a small lake and on a small river, 

 whose banks furnish abundance of wild rice. The discharge 

 of this lake is called Lake de la Pluie River, at whose en- 

 trance there is a rapid, below which is a fine bay, where 

 there had been an extensive picketed fort and building 

 when possessed by the French : the site of it is at present 

 a beautiful meadow, surrounded with groves of oaks. From 

 hence there is a strong current for two miles, where the wa- 



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