BANKS OF RED RIVER. 



129 



course of the stream, before the volume of its waters 

 is augmented by the Assinniboine which comes in at 

 Fort Garry. These projecting bars or points are often 

 covered with fragments of limestone, primitive boulders, 

 and vast numbers of large fresh- water shells. The cur- 

 rent round them is rapid, and during low stages they 

 present an obstacle to the navigation of the river by 

 means of steamers exceeding 120 feet in length. Often, 

 too, on one side or the other, and sometimes on both 

 sides, a narrow belt of heavy forest timber closes upon 

 the river, and seems suddenly to narrow and darken 

 its abrupt windings. The most uniform character, how- 

 ever, and one which is more frequently found on the 

 west side, is a clean and steep hue of bank about thirty 

 feet in altitude, perfectly level to the eye, and forming 

 the boundary of a vast ocean of prairie, whose horizon or 

 intermediate surface is rarely broken by small islands of 

 poplar or willow, and whose long, rank, and luxuriant 

 grasses show everywhere a uniform distribution, and 

 indicate the character of the soil they cover so profusely. 

 A subsequent closer inspection of the soil never failed to 

 establish its fertility and abundance, as well as its distri- 

 bution over areas as far as the eye can reach, both eastward 

 and westward, from the banks of this remarkable river. 



The objects which arrest attention in ascending the 

 river between Sugar Point and the Stone Fort, are 

 limited to precipitous clay banks, fringed with elm, 

 poplar, maple, oak, and ash, all of large growth, but not 

 fair representatives of the forest which once skirted the 

 stream, so long subjected to a destructive culling process, 

 in order to supply the necessities of the settlement 

 above. Among the underbrush, the Virginian creeper, 

 and occasionally a wild grape, with a profusion of convol- 

 vulus twining round hazel, alder, and rose bushes are most 



VOL. I. K 



