Arctic searching expedition : a journal of a boat-voyage through Rupert's Land and the Arctic Sea : in search of the discovery ships under command of Sir John Franklin / by Sir John Richardson.
- John Richardson
- Date:
- 1852
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: Arctic searching expedition : a journal of a boat-voyage through Rupert's Land and the Arctic Sea : in search of the discovery ships under command of Sir John Franklin / by Sir John Richardson. Source: Wellcome Collection.
Provider: This material has been provided by the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, Harvard Medical School.
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![over the surface of the ground, far beyond the reach of any modern means of transport. Thunder and heavy rain detained us in our encampment the whole of the following day; but some improvement in the weather taking place at midnight, we embarked, and at one in the morn- ing of the ] 6th entered Sturgeon River, named by the voyagers, on account of its many bad rapids, La Riviere Maligne. We made two portages, and an hour after noon reached Beaver Lake. The entire bed of the river consists of limestone, sometimes lying in nearly horizontal layers more or less fissured ; in other places broken up into large loose slabs, tilted up and riding on each other. Boulders of granite occur in various parts of the river, some of them of considerable magnitude, and rising high out of the water. In the lower part of the river the banks are sandy, a considerable deposit of dry, light soil overlies the limestone, and vegetation is early and vigorous. When we left Lake Superior, in the middle of May, the de- ciduous trees gave little promise of life; and, in ascending the Kamenistikwoya, we were glad to let the eye dwell upon the groves of aspens which skirt the streams in that undulating and rocky district, and which, when well massed, gave a pleasing va- riety to the wintry aspect of the landscape—the silvery hue of their leafless branches and young stems contrasting well with the sombre green of the spruce fir, which forms the bulk of the forest. On the 27th of May, while ascending Church Reach of Rainy River, we had been cheered by the lovely yellowish hue of the aspens just unfolding their young leaves; but the ice, lingering on Lake Winipeg, when we crossed it, had kept down the tem- perature, spring had not yet assumed its sway, and the trees were leafless. Now, the season seemed to be striding onward rapidly, and the tender foliage was trembling on all sides in the bright sunshine. It was in a patch of burnt woods in this vicinity that, in the year 1820, I discovered the beautiful Eutoca Franklinii, now so common an ornament of our gardens. Constantly, since the 1st of June, the song of the Fringilla leucophrys has been heard day and night, and so loudly, in the stillness of the latter season, as to deprive us at first of rest. It whistles the first bar of Oh dear, what can the matter be! in a clear tone, as if played on a piccolo fife ; and, though the dis- tinctness of the notes rendered them at first very pleasing, yet, as](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b21074458_0063.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
