Paul Kane's Journal of his Western Travels, 1846-1848 - History and ...

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Wanderings of an Artist realize howeas' y th chapter
imply pre ent a co ation - not a very careful
one, obviously - of reports that would emerge weD
before Kane's book was published eleven years Later,
The inclusion of the material in its inaccurate form
probably came to Kane's notice. It appearance may
simply represent the publisher's decision to dramatize
Indian violence; such a scene, because it would help
sales of the publication, could not be passed up.
As the accompanying map shows, Paul Kane
took the following route to the Pacific Coast and back
in the years 1846, 1847, and 1848. Leaving Toronto on
May 9, ] 846, Kane went by coach and steamboat to
Mackinac (in present-day Michigan between Lakes
Huron and Michigan), There, as has been mentioned,
he missed the connecting steamboat and had to row a
The American Art Journal/Volume XXI • Numher2
rented skiff to Sault Sainte Marie, where he took
passage ona schooner across Lake Superior to Fort
William (now Thunder Bay, Ontario), At this point,
Kane joined the brigade of the Hudson's Bay Company,
traveling on the regular westward route, up the
Kaministikwia River to the height ofland between the
Great Lakes and the Lake Winnipeg-Hudson Bay
watersheds. Then the brigade followed the most difficult
and demanding stretch of tiny rivers and rocky
and swampy portages, down the Savanne, Maligne,
and Namakan rivers ,(through modem Quetico
Provincial Park) to Rainy Lake and Fort Frances;
thence down Rainy River (the present-day border
between Minnesota and Ontario) to Lake of the
Woods. The water route then continued north out of
this wondrous lake, down the Winnipeg River to Lake
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