Rivière

“ Rivière des Yrocois, very beautiful, with many islands and meadows. It comes from Lac de Champlain, five or fix days' journey in length, abounding in fish and game of different kinds. Vines, nut, plum, and chestnut trees abound in many places. There are meadows and very pretty islands in it. To reach it, it is necessary to pass one large and one small fall. [28]
24. Sault de Rivière du Saguenay, fifty leagues from Tadoussac, ten or twelve fathoms high. ”

“ The place is called Petite Riviere, and they say, its inhabitants are very poor, which seems very probable. They have no more land to cultivate, than what lies between the mountains and the river, which in the widest part is not above three musket shot, and in most parts but one broad. About seventeen French miles from Quebec the water is so salty in the river, that no one can drink it, our rowers therefore provided themselves with a kettle [200] full of fresh water this morning. ”

“ Thence we continued our course to the entrance of Lake St. Peter, where the country is exceedingly pleasant and level, and crossed the lake, in two, three, and four fathoms of water, which is some eight leagues long and four wide. On the north side, we saw a very pleasant river, extending some twenty leagues into the interior, which I named St. Suzanne; on the south side, there are two, one called Rivière du Pont, the other, Rivière de Gennes, [334] which are very pretty, and in a fine and fertile country. The water is almost still in the lake, which is full of fish. ”

“ Moves all nature to gladness and mirth.” But our later thoughts of the lumbermen were not altogether grateful, when we arrived that day, after a mile of portage, at the little Rivière Blanche, upon which we had counted to float us down to Lac Tchitagama, and found that they had stolen all its water to float their logs down the Lake of the Bear. ”

“ It is still the river of Marquette and Joliet, Nicolet, Groseilliers and Radisson, La Salle and Tonty, Hennepin and Accau, Gray Gowns and Black Gowns, Iberville and Bienville, St. Ange and Laclede; for across every portage into the valley of that river, it was the men of France, so far as we know, who passed, first of Europeans, from Lake Erie up to Lake Chautauqua; or across to Fort Le Boeuf and down French Creek into the Alleghany and the Ohio (La Belle Rivière) ; or up the Maumee and across to the Wabash (the Appian Way) ”

“ We were, in fact, on the extreme head-waters of the Great North Fork of White river; the Unica of the Cherokees, and the Riviere au Blanc of the French. The manner in which the waters develop themselves on descending the southern slope of these highlands, is remarkable. They proceed in plateaux or steps, on each of which the stream deploys in a kind of lake, or elongated basin, connected with the next succeeding one by a narrow rapid. The rock is a grey sandstone in the lower situations, capped with limestone. In some places the water wholly disappears, and seems to permeate the rock. ”

“ La dicte rivière est large de plus de quarante lieues de latitude en son entrée et ceste largeur au dedans bien trente ou quarante lieues el est toute pleine d’isles qui entrent bien dix ou douze lieues en la mer et est fort dangereuse de rochers et baptures. La dicte rivière est par quarante et deux degrez de la haulteur du polle artique.
“Audedans de la dicte rivière quinze lieues y a une ville qui s’ appelle Norombègue et y a en elle de bonnes gens et y a force pelleteries de toutes bestes. Les gens de la ville sont vestuz de pelleteries, portans manteaulx de martres. ”

“ Out of the lake flows the Riviere de François, over rocks of considerable height. This river is very irregular, both as to its breadth and form; and it is so interspersed with islands, that, in its whole course, its banks are seldom visible. Of its various channels, that which is generally followed by the canoes is obstructed by five portages. The distance hence to Lake Huron is about twenty-five leagues. There is scarcely a foot of soil to be seen from one end of the river to the other; for its banks consist entirely of rock. ”

“ From this place we proceeded to a bay called La Baye de Toutes Isles, [268] of some fourteen or fifteen leagues in extent, a dangerous place on account of the presence of banks, shoals, and reefs. The country presents a very unfavorable appearance, being filled with the same kind of trees which I have mentioned before. Here we encountered bad weather.
Hence we passed on near a river, six leagues distant, called Rivière de l'Isle Verte, [269] there being a green island at its entrance. ”

“ Le pays est couvert de pins bas et rabougris; il est exposé au nord, et le froid y est si violent, que, quoique l'on fût en été, ou pouvait à peine le supporter. Les Espagnols marchèrent pendant trois jours le long de ces montagnes, espérant toujours trouver une descente pour arriver à la rivière qui, d'en haut, ne paraissait pas avoir plus d'une brasse de large, et qui, selon les Indiens, avait plus d'une demi-lieue ”

“ The next morning I took the steamer down the river to Blue Spring, a distance of some thirty miles, on my way back to New Smyrna, to a place where there were accessible woods, a beach, and, not least, a daily sea breeze. The river in that part of its course is comfortably narrow,—a great advantage,—winding through cypress swamps, hammock woods, stretches of prairie, and in one place a pine barren; an interesting and in many ways beautiful country, but so unwholesome looking as to lose much of its attractiveness. ”

“ There are rivers whose currents, running red with the silt and mud of their soft alluvial shores, carry far into the ocean the record of their muddy progress; but this glorious river system, through its many lakes and various names, is ever the same crystal current, flowing pure from the fountain-head of Lake Superior. Great cities stud its shores; but they are powerless to dim the transparency of its waters. Steam-ships cover the broad bosom of its lakes and estuaries; but they change not the beauty of the water, no more than the fleets of the world mark the waves of the ocean. ”

“ The river itself rises in one of those lost and nameless lakes in the Floridan central ridge, then is hidden at once in the live oak and cypress forests that creep inland from the coasts. But it can never be said truly to flow. Over the billiard-table flatness of that land it moves so slowly and silently that it gives the effect of a lake stirred by the wind. These dark waters, and the moss-draped woodlands through which they move, are the especial treasure-field and delight of the naturalist and scientist from the great universities of the North. ”

“ When leaving the dock on the Niagara River Line steamers at Lewiston, or coming up the river from Niagara-on-the-Lake, it is enthralling to look up at these great cliffs, and in imagination casting the mind back into the centuries, see the mighty river as it once poured its torrents direct in one concentrated mass from the edge of these heights into the open river lying at their feet. ”

“ Arising from the bottom of the Big Blue River, the emigrants are again upon the high and undulating prairie. Every variety of scenery is presented to the view, and springs of water, issuing from the cliffy banks of the small branches and ravines, and shaded by groves of trees offer many places for rest and refreshment. ”

“ This you can readily understand from daily experience at Riverside. Like the verandah there, the poop of the Congress here commands a wide-spread panorama of water, mountain, and valley, ever varying in its aspects of lights and shade, sunshine and clouds, tints and coloring, and tempting one to give too much time to mere admiration of the changing picture.
When the atmosphere is peculiarly brilliant, the mountains stand out with a nearness and strength of light that exposes to clear view the chisellings of their minutest features. ”

“ The river itself had many of the elements of nobility and beauty as, taking its rise in the snowy heights of the New England ranges, it clove its way eastward, finally debouching into the blue waters of the Pacific. The river-flats formed magnificent stretches of arable lands; too rich, indeed, for such cereals as wheat and oats, for their rank growth rendered them liable to the fatal rust. ”

“ After refreshing ourselves with pure, clear, and cold water from the old well,—made by the French, and re-walled a few years ago,—we turn away, with "a longing, lingering look behind", and continue our drive through the great prairie, which resembles the fertile meadow land along the Connecticut River. We stop a few moments near a picturesque little church of gray unpainted wood, and look off over the verdant fields to the point where a distant shimmer of water catches the eye, and the hills bound the picture. ”

“ Maurice or the Richelieu, the Lièvre or the Saguenay, the Ottawa or portions of the St. Lawrence, with the grim Azoic rocks, the turbulent rapids and the somber pines. What a superb river system it is! Tell them off on your fingers and you'll have to go on borrowing from them afterwards and then all over again. Think of all those rivers that cluster in the French Canada and feed the mighty Gulf of St. Lawrence. There are the Ottawa, the Gatineau, the Rideau, the Richelieu, the Lièvre, the Matanne, the Metapedia, the Métis, the Saguenay. Those are the ones we know. ”

“ This prairie would be monotonous were it not dotted with small round ponds, like hand-mirrors for the flitting birds and sailing clouds, were its expanse not spotted with herds of cattle, scattered or clustering like fishing-boats on a green sea, were it not for a cabin here and there, a field of cane or cotton, a garden plot, and were it not for the forests which break the horizon line, and send out dark capes into the verdant plains. On a gray day, or when storms and fogs roll in from the Gulf, it might be a gloomy region, but under the sunlight and in the spring it is full of life and color ”

“ Neat white houses and elegant mansions are seen on the open plain, or peeping above the dense vegetation when constructed upon a gentle rising hill. As far as the eye can reach over the tranquil [140] waters, small wooded islands stud the ocean, and more distant, land indistinctly appears. The river, or creek, is animated by numerous native boats of all classes, passing and repassing, engaged in various occupations, or lying tranquilly at rest, like the sea-bird upon the waters, after its toil is over. ”

“ From the Falls of Saint Anthony to the junction with the Missouri, near Saint Louis, the river flows through a valley of great beauty and uniform fertility. Cliffs and rocky bluffs, from 200 to 300 feet high, give a picturesque character to that part of the valley below Rock Island, where it strikes the Carboniferous strata, the geological formation of the valley, to about 100 miles below the Missouri. ”

“ The next day brought us to a lovely little spot, a small prairie of perhaps 200 acres, surrounded by low wooded hills, and on one side a lake winding with many an inlet amongst the hills and into the plain, while here and there a tiny promontory, richly clothed with pines and aspens, stretched out into the water. The beauty of the place had struck the rude voyageurs, its only visitors, except the Indians, and they had named it La Belle Prairie. ”

“ Between Beaver and Boat Encampment the river valley is narrow, and there are no settlements to speak of. In many places the two ridges of the Rocky mountains press down to the waters of the river. The country is wild, and in April the summits to the east and west show snowy caps, like stalwart nurses out in the city parks, guarding perambulators and leading toddling youngsters. ”

“ Our afternoon drive from the Au Sable to Ottowa was through a treeless prairie, looking very much like a vast lake or ocean. So much is this appearance acknowledged by the country people that they call the stage coach, a prairie schooner. When{135} the sun shines brightly over the landscape, its yellow light gives the prairie an azure hue, so that one can scarcely see where the earth ends, and the sky begins. The undulations are a very singular feature in the landscape. ”

“ When within a mile and a half of the river, those of us who can, walk, as it is dangerous driving after dark, and we take across, down a hill, across a little canyon, at the head of which stands a little house with a light in the window that looks inviting, but on we go, across a narrow channel of the river, on to an island covered with diamond willow bushes, and a few trees. See a light from several "prairie schooners" that have cast anchor amid the bushes, and which make a very good harbor for these ships of the west. ”

“ I can take this boat within an inch of every island and crag and headland between here and Lake Ontario and never scrape off an ounce of paint. I’ve sailed on the ocean, too, and all up and down the Great Lakes. This St. Lawrence river was always like a little pet kitten to me. ”

“ The view up the Peace River from the high prairie level is singularly beautiful, the river disclosing a series of reaches, like inland lakes, far to the west, whilst from the south comes the immense valley of the Heart, and, farther up, the Smoky River, a great tributary which drains a large extent of prairie country mixed with timber. ”

“ Sea-captains tell us that ten miles from the River's mouth—so powerfully does the mighty current cleave the sea—they can dip up fresh water. But now, to west and north and south, the deep blue, though crossed by the pale green of the River water, assures us that we are fairly upon the Bar. The River of the West is all behind us. ”

“ The river itself winds considerably for so great a body of water; the forest, too, is luxuriant, and the hillsides are covered with heavy fir; numerous islands occur at intervals, wooded and exceedingly pretty. Where the river has worked its way through the Coast Mountains, the scenery, though not so abrupt, stern or impressive as that of the middle Columbia, presents many fine effects, the lofty walls of the river being surmounted by hills of considerable altitude. ”

“ To the west is Black River Point, with its rocky promontories, and on the north stretches out an unbroken expanse of water, with here and there the long black trail of a steamer floating in the air, its wake like a white line upon the water ”