Lake Albert

“ That many considerable affluents flow into the Albert lake there is no doubt. The two waterfalls seen by telescope upon the western shore descending from the Blue Mountains must be most important streams, or they could not have been distinguished at so great a distance as fifty or sixty miles; the natives assured me that very many streams, varying in size, descended the mountains upon all sides into the general reservoir. ”

“ Therefore if we travel the distance to Kavalli, say 550 miles at an average of 6 miles per day, we should reach Lake Albert about the last day of September.
A conception of the character of more than half of the country to be traversed may be had by glancing at our surroundings. It will be a bush and forested country with a native path more or less crooked connecting the various settlements of the tribes dwelling in it.
The track now and then will be intersected by others connecting the tribes north of our route and those south of it. ”

“ A feature of Lake Albert Edward Nyanza is the thick haze which overhangs the water during the dry season, blotting out from view the mountains. In the rains, when the sky is clear, the magnificent panorama of hills encircling the lake on the west and north-west is revealed. The lake water is clear of a light green colour, and distinctly brackish. Fish abound, as do waterfowl, crocodiles and, in the southern swamps, hippopotami. In the rainy season the lake is subject to violent storms. ”

“ But since those first visits Lake Albert, already temporarily annexed to the Khedive's possessions, has been navigated in every direction by two steamers, which to pass the Nile cataracts had to be taken to pieces and put together again above the last portages. The transport of the Khedive required no less than 4,800 hands, of which 600 were needed to haul the boiler across the swamps, through the woods, and over the hills. The escarpments along the east coast are far more elevated than those on the opposite side. ”

“ Thus the same chain of mountains that fed the Victoria on the east must have a watershed to the west and north that would flow into the Albert Lake. The general drainage of the Nile basin tending from south to north, and the Albert Lake extending much farther north than the Victoria, it receives the river from the latter lake, and thus monopolizes the entire head-waters of the Nile. The Albert is the grand reservoir, while the Victoria is the eastern source. ”

“ It is very poor country up there, and the trees are not very large. From the Churchill he had been down to Hudson bay, and he had been as far west as Ile à la Crosse lake and on to Methye lake, which is not many miles south of Clearwater river and in an east-southeasterly direction from McMurray.
The land between Lac la Ronge and Prince Albert in some places is very good. It is all forest practically until to about thirty miles from Prince Albert, or perhaps twenty or thirty. Then the open country begins where it is not heavily timbered. ”

“ Southward to the horizon stretched a great plain of snowy salt—the grim and silent ghost of a dead sea of the past, which once covered all this accursed land, but being cut off by volcanic changes in the country below from the Gulf of California, dried up beneath the blazing sun of the south, and passed away forever. Across this vast white plain, as across the waters of a placid lake, the moon threw a track of shimmering light so bright as to almost dazzle the eyes of the beholder. ”

“ Westward the ranges of Las Trampas and Alameda, and over them, the high peak of Tamalpais to the northward of the Golden Gate. Far away to the northwest, where Napa, Lake, and Sonoma counties meet, is dimly discernible the summit of Mount St. Helens. A white mist is on the western horizon, but, even as we gaze, the curtain unrolls and lifts from the scene, and we see the city of the Pacific, proud San Francisco, the Golden Gate, and the blue ocean beyond, aye, even a steamer far out at sea, heading for the portal of the golden land. ”

“ No rivers of any great importance feed the Albert Edward Lake, though there are several which are from twenty to fifty feet wide and two feet deep. The largest is said to be the Mpanga and the Nsongi. This being so, the most important river from the south cannot have a winding course of more than sixty miles, so that the farthest reach of the Albertine sources of the Nile cannot extend further than 1° 10′ south latitude. ”

“ As we descend from Karimi to the basin of the Albert Edward the first thing we become conscious of is that we are treading the dry bed of a lake. We do not require a gifted geologist to tell us that. Five feet of rise to the lake would increase its extent five miles to the north and five miles to the south. Fifty feet of rise would restore the lake to its old time-honoured condition, when its waves rolled over the pebbled beach under the shadows of the forest near Mtsora. ”

“ Albert Nyan′za, a lake in Equatorial Africa, in the Nile basin, discovered by Sir Samuel Baker in 1864, 150 m. long by 40 broad, and 2500 feet above sea-level.
Alber′ta (26) , a fertile region with large forests in British America, on the E. slope of the Rocky Mountains, the south abounding in cattle ranches, and the mountainous districts in minerals.
Alberti, an illustrious Florentine family, rivals of the Medicis and the Albrizzi. ”

“ Many of them for some time still had to continue fighting, and there were numerous engagements with Bolshevik bands and ex-var prisoners, armed by the Bolsheviks, east and vest of Lake Baikal, and also occasionally severe engagements on the Volga and in the Urals, but we were everywhere masters of the situation and won easy victories. The Bolsheviks were formidable only when facing disorganised soldiers or defenceless inhabitants of towns or country districts, but they were easily beaten by regular and well-organised troops. ”

“ Of the numerous lakes of the province, Athabasca, which Alberta shares with Saskatchewan, has a surface of 2,850 square miles, but Lesser Slave Lake, the largest entirely within the province, is only four hundred and eighty square miles in extent. The rivers of Alberta are more important than the lakes. The four principal are the North and the South Saskatchewan; the Athabasca and the Peace river, which all rise in the Rocky Mountains, flow in an easterly or north-easterly direction, and have numerous tributaries, amongst which are some which might themselves take rank as important rivers. ”

“ Toward Fond du Lac, on the south, the horizon is the lake. South-southwestward, Black Wolf Point runs out, just over the verge, and the tops of the tall trees upon it peep up into view, like shadowy pile-work. Westward are the well-kept hospital grounds, fringed with stately elms overhanging the firm, gravelly beach, studded with ice-heaved bowlders, which extends northward to Neenah. The view to the north and northeast is delightfully hazy, being now dark with delicate fringes of forest which cap the occasional limestone promontories, and again losing itself in a watery sky-line. ”

“ There is a quiet horror about the Great Lakes which grows as one revisits them. Fresh water has no right or call to dip over the horizon, pulling down and pushing up the hulls of big steamers; no right to tread the slow, deep-sea dance-step between wrinkled cliffs; nor to roar in on weed and sand beaches between vast headlands that run out for leagues into haze and sea-fog. Lake Superior is all the same stuff as what towns pay taxes for, but it engulfs and wrecks and drives ashore, like a fully accredited ocean—a hideous thing to find in the heart of a continent. ”

“ He alone will realize that here is a land of greater power, larger measures, and bigger horizons.
And yet with Kintla comes climax. Crossing the border the mountains subside, the glaciers disappear. Canada's Waterton Lakes Park begins at our climax and merges in half a dozen miles into the great prairies of Alberta. It is many miles northwest before the Canadian Rockies assume proportions of superlative scenic grandeur.
The Belly River Valleys
To realize the growing bigness of the land northward one has only to cross the wall from Iceberg Lake into the Belly River canyon. "Only," indeed! ”

“ Mount Cleveland rises 6,300 feet sheer above the head of the lake. Waterton Lake townsite, Alberta, is located at the foot. It is reached by highway from Glacier Park, Babb, Cardston, Lethbridge, Calgary, and points in the Canadian Rockies. The modern Prince of Wales Hotel, several other hostelries, cabin camps, garages, stores, and other conveniences are in the settlement. A 12-mile spur highway leads to Cameron Lake, another international body of water on whose northern (Canadian) shore is a fine example of a sphagnum bog. ”

“ From the summit another rivulet trickles away to the south, and finds its way through a frightful tamarack swamp, and through woods scarred by ruthless lumbering, to Mud Pond, a quiet body of water, with a ghastly fringe of dead trees, upon which people of grand intentions and weak vocabulary are trying to fix the name of Elk Lake. The descent of the pass on that side is precipitous and exciting. The way is in the stream itself; and a considerable portion of the distance we swung ourselves down the faces of considerable falls, and tumbled down cascades. ”

“ A wilderness of bowlders compels the winding about of the trail, but we hear and see Five Lake Creek, roaring and dashing along, for it has a large flow of water and its course is steep and rocky. We pass through groups of willows, wild currants and alders, enter a sparsely wooded meadow and in a few moments see the first of the Five Lakes. There is but little difference in their levels, though their sizes vary considerably. The first one is the largest. Here is a log cabin and two or three boats. These are owned by the Deer Park Springs resort, and are for their fishing and hunting patrons. ”

“ Lake Athabasca, Great Slave, and Great Bear Lake continue across the continent, that great Lacustrine line, which, with Winnipeg, Superior, Huron, and Ontario, forms an aggregate of water surface half as large as Europe.
Of other lakes, the country is simply a vast network, beyond all attempt at name or number; of every size, from a hundred yards to a hundred miles in length, they lie midst prairie, or midst forest, lonely and silent, scarce known even to the wild man’s ken. ”

“ Alberta is a vast plateau from 2,000 to 3,000 feet above sea-level, hung by its western edge on the foothills of the Rocky Mountains. It slopes gently toward the east and north. Absolutely level plains form no great proportion of the surface. While open, treeless country characterizes the southern part of the Province, the greater part is undulating, diversified by forest, stream, hill and open country, not unlike Ontario or New York State. Beautiful lakes, fringed with forest and abounding in whitefish are scattered over its central and northern area. ”

“ Lawrence did heave that July evening, no mistake about it. A fresh west wind was blowing over the lake, and the spray was dashing up with sea-like violence as we steamed away from the wooden wharves of Kingston, heading down-stream for the Thousand Islands. Lake Ontario, when it chooses, can get up a very decent storm indeed; quite as fine a storm as any to be seen upon the German Ocean, with huge four-masters from Chicago stranding helplessly on the reefs and spits; and even the river can run seas-high in its broader reaches among the wide expansion known as the Lake of the Thousand Islands. ”

“ That Congress did not act arbitrarily in determining that 'for the purposes of navigation of said waters and the waters connected therewith,' the whole flow of the stream should be devoted exclusively to that end, is most evident when we consider the character of this stream and its relation to the whole problem of lake navigation. The river St. Marys is the only outlet for the waters of Lake Superior. The stretch of water called the falls and rapids of the river is about 3,000 feet long, and from bank to bank has a width of about 4,000 feet. ”

“ East of the Steens Mountains there is a chain of very small lakes, such as the Juniper, Manns and Alvord lakes, and also a playa known as the Alvord Desert, which in the spring is covered with a few inches, or perhaps 1 or 2 ft., of water, and becomes a lake with an area of 50 or 60 sq. m. In the summer the dry bed is smooth and very hard, and when the skies are clear the monotony of the landscape is sometimes broken by a mirage. In Lake county, occupying fault-made troughs, are several large bodies of water—Lake Abert (about 5 m. by 15 m.) ”

“ It is possible also that a new park may be created between Rocky Mountain Park and Jasper Park, to embrace the little-known Brazeau River country and possibly the upper waters of the North Saskatchewan, with the great peaks that lie up toward the continental divide. Down near the International Boundary, at the extreme southwestern corner of the province of Alberta, is Waterton Lake Park. ”

“ The agricultural resources of this region of rocks are certainly meagre compared with those of Peace River. Potatoes, where there is any available soil, grow to a good size; barley was nearly ripe when we were there, and wheat ripens, too. But, of course, it is not a farming region, nor are fish plentiful at the west end of the lake, the Athabasca River, which enters there, giving for over twenty miles eastward a muddy hue to the water. The rest of the lake is crystal clear, and whitefish are plentiful, also lake trout, which are caught up to thirty, and even forty, pounds' weight. ”

“ Ice holds fast this beautiful sheet for six months every year. As we puff along the surface of its incomparable blue it is hard to realise that, although the Peace and Athabasca Rivers open their icy mouths about May-day, parts ot the lake are not free for travel until mid-May. The lake freezes fast at Fort Chipewyan some time in November. Lying on the deck of the tug, we look down and take inventory of our odd tow. Just behind comes the scow. It holds wood for the engine, a long sled, a canoe, a "skift," all this year's trading supplies for Fond du Lac, and half a dozen chained husky dogs. ”