gives the appearance of two horseshoes joining in the middle, as if two separate streams had happened to come together here. This peculiar conformation throws the masses of water together in the middle, whence they are thrown up again by the resulting force, as if shot out of a cannon. The turmoil is farther increased by projecting rocks, (perhaps piles of fragments from above,) which, on the right particularly, shoot the water inwards towards the centre, at right angles with the course of the river. Then the sharp projecting shelves which project, especially on the right side, through the falling sheet, cause a succession of little falls in the face of the great one.

All these peculiarities are due no doubt to the nature of the rock, which, dipping slightly from the fall, and not being underlain by softer strata, as at Niagara, its recession is not regular, but depends on the accidental dislodgment of blocks on the edge, by frost, collision of ice, &c., and the blocks again, when fallen are not so readily decomposed or removed. Hence, also, the shallowness of the channel below. Some of our friends who meanwhile had been exploring above the Falls, reported a small fall, ten or fifteen feet in height, about half a mile above, where the slate was replaced by sienite.

We had some thought of proceeding up the river to Dog Lake, two days' journey to the north. But our men grumbled very much at the thought of the portages, (one of which from its destructiveness to shoes is called Knife, or Devil Portage ;) then our canoes were too large for the undertaking, and might possibly be knocked to pieces; so we concluded to give that up.

July 24th.-Last night was warm and rainy, and we started down the river this morning in a drizzle. We stopped at the clay-bank, above which we had encamped before, to get some clay-stones, which occur here in abundance at the water's edge. These are nodules of clay, some soft, others of the hardness of chalk or harder, often in shapes requiring little aid of the knife to transform them into fantastic images. Capt. Bayfield says the bottom of Lake Superior is of clay, which readily indurates on exposure to the air.*

Kaministiquia, according to our native authorities, signifies "the river that goes far about," which this river certainly does, though in

*Bouchette's British Dominions in North America, I., 127.

the course of its windings it presents such a variety of beautiful scenes of overshadowing forest, that we did not grudge the delay. Two or three miles down, long after we had lost the roar of the Falls, it suddenly came to us again, quite distinctly and unmistakably, probably owing to some shift of wind.

This valley is the only spot we saw on the lake that seemed at all to invite cultivation; indeed, if we except the posts, almost the only place where cultivation seemed possible. The better quality of the soil was abundantly manifest in the size of the forest trees. The crumbling banks of loam and sand furnished abodes to large numbers of sand-martins and kingfishers. We were seven hours in reaching the Fort, and found our companions had left two hours before.

CHAPTER III.

FORT WILLIAM BACK TO THE SAULT.

July 25th.-We proposed to visit the copper-mine at Prince's Location, on the shore of the lake about twenty miles to the westward, and thence to cross to Isle Royale. In order to travel more rapidly we sent the bateau back to Point Porphyry to await our return, and proceeded with the two canoes only.

Starting at about ten o'clock, we found the wind strong ahead and encamped early in a bay about fourteen miles from the Fort. On the way we passed Pie Island, a large mountainous island, so called from an isolated peak on the west, which bears a strong resemblance, not at all to a pie, but to a French pâté, or pasty, with high sides; and this is its true name. A porcupine was killed on the beach as we landed, and proved very good meat.

In the evening the Professor made the following remarks on the distribution of animals and plants:

"There is no animal, and no plant, which in its natural state is found in every part of the world, but each has assigned to it a situation corresponding with its organization and character. The cod, the trout, and the sturgeon are found only in the north, and have no antarctic representatives. The cactus is found only in America, and almost exclusively in the tropical parts. Humboldt, to whom the earliest investigations on this subject are due, extends the principle not only to the distribution of plants according to latitude, but also according to vertical elevation above the surface of the earth in the same latitudes. Thus an elevation of fourteen thousand feet under the tropics corresponds to 53° north latitude in America, and 68° in Europe. The vegetation on the summit of Mt. Etna would correspond with that of Mt. Washington, and this again with the summits of the Andes, and the level of the sea in the Arctic regions. In the ascent of a high mountain, we have, as it were, a vertical section of the strata of vegetation which

'crop out' or successively appear as we advance towards the north over a wide extent of country.

"But in dwelling on the resemblances between the plants of high latitudes and those of high mountains, we must not lose sight of their not less constant differences. In the northern regions in general, we find the number of species comparatively small. Thus in the region through which we have passed, and which has already a northern character, we find vegetation characterized by great vigor; the whole country covered with trees and shrubs, and lichens and mosses in great profusion, but the species few, and the proportion of handsome flowering shrubs small. In the Alps, on the other hand, vegetation is characterized by great beauty and variety, and the number of brilliantly flowering plants, of Gentianaceæ, Primulaceæ and Compositæ, is very great. The plants, however, are dwarfish, and vegetation comparatively scanty; the lichens and mosses much less abundant. There is, then, not an identity, but an analogy only, and an imperfect though very interesting one, between Alpine and Arctic vegetation."

July 26th.-We pursued our way this morning under the shadow of magnificent walls of basaltic rock, with Pie Island rising in the distance outside of us like a Gibraltar. We reached the Location early in the forenoon, and were most kindly received by Mr. Robinson, the agent of the Montreal Mining Co., who have begun operations here.

A high rocky promontory, running S.W., (parallel to Thunder Cape and the other high ridges hereabouts,) is here cut across by a sort of fault or interval, leaving a strip of land rising gently from the lake on either side, to a ridge in the middle, backed on the north-east by cliffs seven hundred feet in height. The slope from the little curved beach where we landed was shaded by scattered trees left from the forest. Under these the workmen were busy in putting up cabins for a number of miners who had just come up with Mr. Robinson, and who, for the present, were living in tents on the beach. Back of these, was a row of cabins, and the little one-story house of the agent. Mr. R. showed us a large number of minerals collected hereabouts, and kindly offered us whatever of them we chose to take. Among them were very brilliant specimens of calc-spar associated with cobalt, manganese, and blue and green sulphurets of copper.