Peeps at Many Lands: Canada

by J. T. Bealby

You can easily hear the swing of the oars, and catch the slight melancholy of the memory-haunting lilt as the singers keep time to the swaying of their bodies! And you can see the round rosy face of the big, burly, boyish-looking coureur de bois, or "runner of the woods," suddenly blanch, whilst his big black eyes grow bigger than ever, as he imagines he sees the weird flying canoe of some reckless woodsman who has sold his soul to the Evil One in return for the power of being able to make his fragile birch-bark canoe rise, as it were, on invisible wings into the air, and so speed along without paddle or punting-pole.

Now, whilst the French collected furs through the country of the Great Lakes, and from the wide regions to the west and south of them, the English, through the Hudson Bay Company, claimed a similar monopoly of the profitable fur trade farther north. And not only did they claim and maintain their supremacy as the sole fur-trading company in the North-West, they eventually grew so powerful that they carried on a regular system of government, administering the laws and punishing offenders.

Throughout all the north and west, in the towns and often in far isolated districts, we find the stores or trading-posts of the Hudson's Bay Company. This is the last of the great proprietary corporations, which at one time were so lavishly treated by European Sovereigns to privileges of unknown extent and value. The company was formed in 1670 by Prince Rupert, a cousin of Charles II., and certain associates, with proprietorship, sovereignty, and permission to trade in what was called "Rupert's Land," or all within Hudson Strait. For two centuries and a half they have carried on business, and the volume of trade at present is greater than ever before. They buy furs almost entirely, but sell everything that man desires.

CHAPTER XII

WATERWAYS

One of the most remarkable features of Canada is the great number of lakes and rivers of all sizes, which interlace the land from east to west and north to south. Generally speaking, the country is divided into three great basins, the St. Lawrence and the Great Lakes, the Prairie, and the Pacific Slope.

The great lakes, five in number, form a chain of connected fresh-water seas leading to the Atlantic through the St. Lawrence River, and into them empty a great number of rivers and streams. The greatest of the lakes and farthest west is Superior, 380 miles long. It empties into Lake Huron by the St. Mary's River, where is situated the famous Sault Sainte Marie Rapids, and the town commonly known as the "Soo." Here the river is harnessed, and made to turn the wheels for large pulp and paper mills, while the vessels pass through canals, one on the Canadian and one on the American side.

Lake Michigan is wholly in the United States, and after passing Lake Huron, which is 250 miles long, we traverse the St. Clair River, Lake St. Clair, the smallest of the series, and the Detroit River, which brings us into Lake Erie, a large but rather shallow lake, with many important towns and cities on its shores. It is drained into Lake Ontario by the Niagara River, that broad and swift-flowing stream which, after careering down a long course of rapids, plunges over the world-famed Falls, 160 feet, to the rocks below, while the rainbow-tinted spray rises to a height from which it is seen for many miles. The white water hurries along, and rushes headlong through a narrow gorge of rock in a tempestuous rapid, then sweeps round the great basin of the whirlpool to hurry along to Lake Ontario, gradually calming itself as it flows. Famous as is the great cataract, the river has another claim to our interest, for here mankind has laid his heaviest burdens on Nature's shoulder, and day and night the angry river turns the wheels which produce 400,000 horse-power, and light the towns and draw the streetcars for a radius of a hundred miles. Navigation goes on between the two lakes by the Welland Canal, which has twenty-seven locks.

Lake Ontario empties the water of all this great chain by the St. Lawrence River; at its beginning are the Thousand Islands, a summer resort of wondrous beauty, which wealthy citizens from Canada and the United States have made into a fairyland. The mighty St. Lawrence, in its course to the sea, has several rapids, where canals have been built; but passenger vessels "shoot" the rapids on their way to Montreal, where is the head of ocean navigation. This waterway, 2,200 miles in length, is unparalleled in the world, and provides the natural highway for the commerce of the Continent. An endless procession of great iron vessels, in tows of three or four, drawn by one large steam barge, passes down the lakes laden with wheat, iron, coal, or timber. Beautifully equipped passenger vessels ply between the ports, offering trips from two hours to a week in duration, while the white sails of the fleets of many a yacht club are to be seen through the summer months.