118 



RED RIVER EXPLORING EXPEDITION. 



to us to stop and camp with them, but not being provided 

 with presents, and having only a very small stock of pro- 

 visions, I thought it advisable to decline the invitation ; 

 leaving a few pieces of tobacco on the portage path we 

 hastened to the mouth of the Pennawa, and camped about 

 half a mile down the river. Being anxious to reach Fort 

 Alexander, I awoke the men an hour before daylight, and 

 whilst breakfast was preparing, strolled over the rugged 

 and fissured rocks through which the little river finds its 

 way. The almost oppressive silence was broken only by 

 the occasional splash of a pike, or the distant howling of 

 a wolf, or the subdued roar of the Winnipeg wafted by a 

 very gentle breath of wind which now and then stole from 

 the west. The musk rats were busily engaged swimming 

 across the little ponds which separate the rapids into 

 which the Pennawa is broken, near where it branches off 

 from the Winnipeg. 



Instead of following the course of the Great Winnipeg, 

 after arriving at the Otter Falls, I passed down the Pennawa 

 Eiver into Bonnet Lake, in order to avoid the dangerous 

 " Seven Portages," and save several miles of route. Near 

 the entrance of the Pennawa into Bonnet Lake, the little 

 river winds through an immense marshy area covered 

 with wild rice, and I succeeded in collecting a considerable 

 quantity as the voyageurs paddled through its light and 

 yielding stalks with undiminished speed. There, too, were 

 seen vast numbers of different species of duck, and many 

 other kinds of birds, such as herons, pigeons, woodpeckers, 

 cedar birds, jays, &c. 



The Indians we met lamented the failure of the rice 

 this year ; they described the appearance in favourable 

 seasons of the ground through which we were hurrying, 

 as a vast expanse of waving grain, from which they could 

 soon fill their small canoes, by beating the heads with 



