FOREST AND STREAM 
945 
THROUGH THE LAKELANDS OF QUEBEC 
A JOURNEY INTO A REGION SELDOM VISITED FROM THE OUTSIDE AND WHERE THE WILDER¬ 
NESS IS STILL PRIMEVAL—THE POETRY OF PORTAGE HERE BECOMES AN EVERY DAY REALITY 
By B. C. Cobb. 
This is the story > of an interesting trip made in the autumn of 1915, beginning in the Gatineau 
region, about 125 miles north of Ottawa, the objective having been the Kagebonga Lake Post of 
the Hudson Bay Company, at the Height of Land. It was not a hunting or fishing expedition, par¬ 
ticularly, although the region is ideal for both, as attested by the frequent sight of game, and the 
ease with which fish were caught for camp purposes. — Ed. 
T HURSDAY, September 2. We breakfasted 
at six o’clock at my cabin on Bras Coupe 
Lake, having packed all our supplies the 
day before for our trip to the Barriere. The ba¬ 
rometer registered 29.7; thermometer 50 degrees, 
with the wind in the west and clear and bright. 
We left the cabin at 7.15 A. M., and met Jack 
Heafey’s one horse jumper on the west side of 
Lake Butard after portaging from Bras Coupe 
Lake to the Bittaw and paddling across. In addi¬ 
tion to the one horse jumper we had a pack horse 
to carry our surplus luggage across the seven mile 
portage to Lake Desert. 
In the party were Frank Silliman, Jr., of 
Philadelphia, and myself, besides the following 
guides: Dave Howe, Paddy Ryan, Joe Fraser 
and Sam Dumont; also Dave’s two small dogs. 
We took three birchbark canoes, one an 18 
footer, which we used for carrying supplies, and 
two 14 foot canoes. The jumper broke down 
twice and spilled its load. No particular harm 
was done other than the breaking of a few of 
our jam cans which made a nasty mess in some 
of the dunnage bags. We left Heafey’s at 1 
P. M. and crossed Lake Desert, a beautiful lake, 
about seventeen miles long and anywhere from 
one to four or five miles wide. From Lake Des¬ 
ert we entered Round Lake and then up the 
Tomasine River and into Tomasine Lake; 
camped on Moose Island in the middle of the lake. 
Saw no game except 50 ducks in the narrows 
between Lake Desert and Round Lake. I got 
one wall-eyed pike and one catfish in Tomasine 
Lake which went very well for supper. Did not 
pitch camp until after seven o’clock, which was 
too late as it was getting dark early. We trav¬ 
eled about twenty-four miles by water and seven 
miles by land. Did not use any tents. 
Friday, September 3. Broke camp and left 
Moose Island at 7.15 A. M. We paddled about 
five miles to the head of Tomasine Lake and 
again into Tomasine River which flows in at the 
head of the lake and out at the foot. Tomasine 
Lake is about ten miles long, narrow, but very 
beautiful. It really is a widening of the river. 
We paddled and poled up the Tomasine River 
for about six miles to a lumber camp of the 
Edwards Lumber Company, where we had din¬ 
ner. The camp was not in operation, but a 
“keep-over” man and his wife were there and 
cooked dinner for us—pork and potatoes, stewed 
blueberries, raisin pie and tea. Pork, or “greads,” 
as pork is called by the French-Canadian, pota¬ 
toes and tea form the main and practically the 
only food of the “habitants.” 
We poled and paddled six or seven miles fur¬ 
ther up the Tomasine River and camped for the 
night on the trail to Rock Lake. Just as we 
started to pitch camp a black bear appeared on 
the trail directly in front of us. He soon made 
off, however, and seemed more afraid of us than 
we of him. It was a rough trip up the river 
with three portages below the lumber camp and 
five above. One of the portages was about two 
miles long. We managed, however, to pole and 
paddle the rapids for most of the distance on this 
