10 ASSINNIBOINE AND SASKATCHEWAN EXPEDITION 



and gravel, stretching into the lake in an easterly direction, 

 and separated from the shore by a narrow channel. They 

 are fast wearing away, and in the memory of some of 

 the voyagenrs, were covered ten years since with willows, 

 poplar, and a few spruce. They have probably afforded 

 much of the material for the formation of the beaches 

 which have cut off portions of the lake on the south- 

 west coast, the sand and shingle being drifted along the 

 shore by the long waves which every breeze from the 

 north or a northerly direction creates. The depth of 

 water near the coast is very small ; soundings showed 

 twenty-nine feet of water one mile north of Willow Island, 

 the deepest part yet observed. Near Willow Island 

 w r e met an Indian in a canoe with his wife and two 

 children : he was going to Eed Eiver. I gave him some 

 tobacco and his squaw a small quantity of tea ; in return 

 he unrolled a piece of birch bark and handed me the 

 moufle of a moose, at the same time remarking that he 

 was a conjuror and would " make us a fair wind." The 

 steersman replied that a fair wind for us would be adverse 

 to him. " Ah," said the conjuror, " but I will make one 

 for you and two for myself." 



In the afternoon I landed to examine some cliffs of 

 clay which appear about twenty-three miles from the 

 mouth of the river. They were sixteen feet in altitude, 

 and exposed a clean surface of stratified marl, reposing 

 on a browmish-black clay. The stratification was in thin 

 horizontal layers, easily detached one from the other. 

 The brownish-black clay showed a very tenacious 

 character, so much so, that it was very difficult to break 

 off with the hand masses larger than ten or twelve cubic 

 inches, in any other direction than that of the plane of 

 stratification. It was worn by the action of the waves 



