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36 THE GEBAT LONE LAND.
other, the old, old story of peace and brotherhood, of Christ
and Calvary—a contest so full of interest, so teeming
with adventure, so pregnant with the discovery of mighty
nvers and great inland seas, that one would fain ramble
away into its depths; but it must not be, or else the
journey I have to travel myself would never even begin.
Vast as is the accumulation of fresh water in Lake
Superior, the area of the country which it drains is limited
enough. Fifty miles from its northern shores the rugged
hills which form the backbone or "divide" of the continent
raise their barren heads, and the streams carry from thence
the vast rainfall of this region into the Bay of Hudson.
Thus, when the voyageur has paddled, tracked, poled, and
carried his canoe up any of the many rivers which rush like
mountain torrents into Lake Superior from the north, he
reaches the height of land between the Atlantic Ocean and
Hudson Bay. Here, at an elevation of 1500 feet above
the sea level, and of 900 above Lake Superior, he launches
his canoe upon water flowing north and west; then he has
before him hundreds of miles of quiet-lying lake, of wildlyrushing
river, of rock-broken rapid, of foaming cataract, but
through it all runs ever towards the north the oceanseeking
current. As later on we shall see many and many a
mile of this wilderness—living in it, eating in it, sleeping
in it— although reaching it from a different direction altogether
from the one spoken of now, I anticipate, by
alluding to it here, only as illustrating the track of the
Expedition between Lake Superior and Red River. For
myself, my route was to be altogether a different one. I
was to follow the lines of railroad which ran out into the
frontier territories of the United States, then, leaving the
iron horse, I was to make my way to the settlements on the
west shore of Lake Superior^ and from thence to wovk round