APPROACH TO THE GRAND RAPID. 



465 



loaded boats of the Hon. Hudson's Bay Company descend 

 this rapid easily, and as they are generally " tracked" up 

 with the whole of their lading, a lightened steamer, with 

 powerful engines, might surmount it by taking the best 

 channels and other precautions. 



It is about four miles from the foot of this last rapid to 

 the beginning or summit of the Grand Eapicl. In that 

 distance the river is smooth and deep, but has a very 

 swift current, especially where its bed is contracted. The 

 width of the river in this interval is much diminished, 

 varying from nine chains to a quarter of a mile, and the 

 rate of current is from three to three and a half miles an 

 hour. There are one or two large boulders in the bed 

 of the river here, over and around which the water boils 

 and bubbles like a cauldron ; and now and then shoals 

 on the north side of the channel are indicated by the 

 rippling water and ground-swell occasioned by the cur- 

 rent in passing over them. The land between Cross Lake 

 and the Grand Eapid is generally low and flat, but thickly 

 timbered with balsam-spruce, poplar, tamarack, and birch. 

 At the second rapid, east of Cross Lake, the banks on the 

 north side of the river are eight to ten feet above the 

 surface of the water, and are composed of a light-coloured 

 drift clay. These clay banks gradually increase in height 

 towards the Grand Eapid, where they attain an elevation 

 of upwards of twenty feet ; but it is probable that the 

 surface of the country is nearly level, and that it is the 

 descent in the river which causes the apparent rise in its 

 banks. 



August 22nd. — This being Sunday we did not proceed 

 on our journey till after breakfast (about 8 a.m.). How- 

 ever desirable it might have been, under other circum- 

 stances, to have remained inactive on this day, in the 

 position in which we were placed, like a ship at sea, with 



VOL. I. H H 



