278 ASSINNIBOINE AND SASKATCHEWAN EXPEDITION. 



of description and reference, into six distinct parts, each 

 having its own geological characteristic. The west shore 

 of the lake is mainly occupied by granite, which at the 

 northern portion is finely granular, and porphyritic in 

 equal quantities. On the east coast of its north-westerly ex- 

 tension, are chloritic and greenstone slates ; on the eastern 

 arm of Eainy Lake, pale red granite is the prevailing 

 rock, and near the northern extremity of this arm, naked 

 ridges, white as porcelain, and 500 feet high, occur. 



In the Lake of the Woods the Laurentian series is 

 separated into two parts by a range of intrusive granite 

 running in an E.S.E. direction from the north-west 

 corner of the lake, as far east as Eainy Lake. The in- 

 clined metamorphosed strata on the north side of this 

 granitic anticlinal dip W.N.W. ; on the south side to the 

 S. S. W. a direction resulting from the form and position 

 of the intrusive rock.* 



The country between the sources of the Winnipeg, 

 and a few miles south of Islington Mission, a distance of 

 nearly thirty miles, appears to be largely occupied by a 

 vast range of intrusive granite and syenite, in the form of 

 dome-shaped hills, varying from 150 to 200 feet high. 

 A view from the summit of one of the highest of these, 

 about fifteen miles due north from Eat Portage presented 

 an unvarying succession of their rounded summits as far 

 as the eye could reach in a westerly direction. The 

 canoe route pursued in 1851 was a short Indian path 

 from Eat Portage to the Great Winnipeg, in a nearly 

 straight north-westerly direction. The country traversed 

 was characterized by great sterility, and an unusual pro- 

 portion of bare rock. High precipitous mural cliffs, 

 without a trace of stratification observable in them, often 



* See Dr. Bigsby, " On the Geology of the Lake of the Woods/' before 

 referred to. 



