On the following day, October 21st, they made but a short distance when
they came to a dangerous strait, where the river was compressed for
nearly half a mile between perpendicular rocks, reducing it to the width
of twenty yards, and increasing its violence. Here they were obliged to
pass the canoes down cautiously by a line from the impending banks. This
consumed a great part of a day; and after they had reembarked they were
soon again impeded by rapids, when they had to unload their canoes and
carry them and their cargoes for some distance by land. It is at these
places, called "portages," that the Canadian voyageur exhibits his most
valuable qualities; carrying heavy burdens, and toiling to and fro,
on land and in the water, over rocks and precipices, among brakes and
brambles, not only without a murmur, but with the greatest cheerfulness
and alacrity, joking and laughing and singing scraps of old French
ditties.
The spirits of the party, however, which had been elated on first
varying their journeying from land to water, had now lost some of their
buoyancy. Everything ahead was wrapped in uncertainty. They knew nothing
of the river on which they were floating. It had never been navigated
by a white man, nor could they meet with an Indian to give them
any information concerning it.
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