Lake Winnepeek, or as the French write it Lac Ouinipique, which lies nearest to the foregoing, is composed of the same waters. It is in length about two hundred miles north and south; its breadth has never been properly ascertained, but is supposed to be about one hundred miles in its widest part. This Lake is very full of islands; these are, however, of no great magnitude. Many considerable rivers empty themselves into it, which, as yet, are not distinguished by any names. The waters are stored with fish, such as trout and sturgeon, and also with others of a smaller kind peculiar to these Lakes.
The land on the south-west part of it is very good, especially about the entrance of a large branch of the River Bourbon which flows from the south-west. On this River there is a factory that was built by the French called Fort La Reine, to which the traders from Michillimackinac resort to trade with the Assinipoils and Killistinoes. To this place the Mahahs, who inhabit a country two hundred and fifty miles south-west, come also to trade with them; and bring great quantities of Indian corn to exchange for knives, tomahawks, and other articles. These people are supposed to dwell on some of the branches of the River of the West.
Lake Winnepeek has on the north-east some mountains, and on the east many barren plains. The maple or sugar tree grows here in great plenty, and there is likewise gathered an amazing quantity of rice, which proves that grain will flourish in these northern climates as well as in warmer. Buffaloes, carribboo, and moose deer, are numerous in these parts. The buffaloes of this country differ from those that are found more to the south only in size; the former being much smaller: just as the black cattle of the northern parts of Great Britain differ from English oxen.
On the waters that fall into this Lake, the neighbouring nations take great numbers of excellent furs. Some of these they carry to the factories and settlements belonging to the Hudson’s Bay Company, situated above the entrance of the Bourbon River: but this they do with reluctance on several accounts; for some of the Assinipoils and Killistinoes, who usually traded with the Company’s servants, told me, that if they could be sure of a constant supply of goods from Michillimackinac, they would not trade any where else. They shewed me some cloth and other articles that they had purchased at Hudson’s Bay, with which they were much dissatisfied, thinking they had been greatly imposed upon in the barter.
Allowing that their accounts were true, I could not help joining in their opinion. But this dissatisfaction might probably proceed, in a great measure, from the intrigues of the Canadian traders: for whilst the French were in possession of Michillimackinac, having acquired a thorough knowledge of the trade of the north-west countries, they were employed on that account, after the reduction of Canada, by the English traders there, in the establishment of this trade with which they were themselves quite unacquainted. One of the methods they took to withdraw these Indians from their attachment to the Hudson’s Bay Company, and to engage their good opinion in behalf of their new employers, was by depreciating on all occasions the Company’s goods, and magnifying the advantages that would arise to them from trafficking entirely with the Canadian traders. In this they too well succeeded, and from this, doubtless, did the dissatisfaction the Assinipoils and Killistinoes expressed to me, partly proceed. But another reason augmented it; and this was the length of their journey to the Hudson’s Bay factories, which, they informed me, took them up three months during the summer heats to go and return, and from the smallness of their canoes they could not carry more than a third of the beavers they killed. So that it is not to be wondered at, that these Indians should wish to have traders come to reside among them. It is true that the parts they inhabit are within the limits of the Hudson’s Bay territories, but the Company must be under the necessity of winking at an encroachment of this kind, as the Indians would without doubt protect the traders when among them. Besides, the passports granted to the traders that go from Michillimackinac give them liberty to trade to the north-west about Lake Superior; by which is meant Fort La Reine, Lake Winnepeek, or any other parts of the waters of the Bourbon River, where the Couriers de Bois, or Traders, may make it most convenient to reside.
Lac du Bois, as it is commonly termed by the French in their maps, or in English the Lake of the Wood, is so called from the multiplicity of wood growing on its banks; such as oaks, pines, firs, spruce, &c. This Lake lies still higher up a branch of the River Bourbon, and nearly east from the south end of Lake Winnepeek. It is of great depth in some places. Its length from east to west about seventy miles, and its greatest breadth about forty miles. It has but few islands, and these of no great magnitude. The fishes, fowls, and quadrupeds that are found near it, vary but little from those of the other two lakes. A few of the Killistinoe Indians sometimes encamp on the borders of it to fish and hunt.
This Lake lies in the communication between Lake Superior, and the Lakes Winnepeek and Bourbon. Its waters are not esteemed quite so pure as those of the other lakes, it having, in many places, a muddy bottom.
Lac La Pluye, so called by the French, in English the Rainy Lake, is supposed to have acquired this name from the first travellers, that passed over it, meeting with an uncommon deal of rain; or, as some have affirmed, from a mist like rain occasioned by a perpendicular water-fall that empties itself into a river which lies to the south-west.
This Lake appears to be divided by an isthmus, near the middle, into two parts: the west part is called the Great Rainy Lake, the east, the Little Rainy Lake, as being the least division. It lies a few miles farther to the eastward, on the same branch of the Bourbon, than the last-mentioned Lake. It is in general very shallow in its depth. The broadest part of it is not more than twenty miles, its length, including both, about three hundred miles. In the west part the water is very clear and good; and some excellent fish are taken in it. A great many fowl resort here at the fall of the year. Moose deer are to be found in great plenty, and likewise the carribboo; whose skin for breeches or gloves exceeds by far any other to be met with in North-America. The land on the borders of this Lake is esteemed in some places very good, but rather too thickly covered with wood. Here reside a considerable band of the Chipéways.
Eastward from this Lake lie several small ones, which extend in a string to the great carrying place, and from thence into Lake Superior. Between these little Lakes are several carrying places, which renders the trade to the north-west difficult to accomplish, and exceedingly tedious, as it takes two years to make one voyage from Michillimackinac to these parts.