Volume 1

and
2l8
THE KAMINISTIQUIA ROUTE.
28tJi. Early we embarked in four canoes, with Muffle
d'Orignal [Moose Muzzle] as our guide (Pisaunegawpe). In
Lac la Croix, at Pointe du Mai we struck away from the
Grand Portage route, steering an E. course to the left just
when we had overtaken an X. Y. brigade steering on the old
track to Grand Portage, where they continue to hold their
general rendezvous. The water was remarkably high in
Windigoostigwan, a long, narrow body of water which conducts directly into
Lac des Mille Lacs. This is the largest one on the whole route : compare its
namesake in Minnesota, bearing a similar relation to the many lesser ones about
itself. Among its feeders is one which falls in at its head ;
this is Savanna
or Meadow r., some tributaries of which are gathered from the Height of
Land. The route goes up Savanna r. and takes one of these tributaries,
BOW crossed by the G. P. Ry. The traverse of the highlands includes a small
lake and two portages which Thompson calls Swampy and Meadow, and gives
as respectively 2,659 and 4,566 yards, N. 50° E. and N. 60° E. (reversing his
courses). Dawson's map marks four portages, called Savanne, Middle, Prairie,
and 4 L'Eau Froide. The voyageur was thus brought to Dog r., of the Lake
Superior watershed :
Dog r. is the principal tributary of the Kaministiquia.
In fact, Thompson calls it all Dog r. down to Fort William ;
but the name
now seems to be restricted to the upper reach of the Kaministiquia r., above
Dog 1. Dog river is descended about S. E. to the lake said, the traverse of
which is S. 10 m. Continuing down present Kaministiquia r., the route presents
Dog portage, given by Thompson as 3,181 yards, and many others, as what he
calls Wandering portage, 848 yards. Mountain portage, and Lazy portage
(Portage Paresseux of the voyageurs). Dawson names Dog Portage, Little
Dog Portage, Mokaman or Mokoman falls, Island falls. Portage Ecarte, and
Kababeka or Kakabeka falls, besides numerous rapids, before coming to Lazy
portage (lettered " Parisseux Rapid ").
It thus appears that Henry's Kaministiquia route was practically identical
with the present Dawson route from Lac la Croix to Lac des Mille Lacs, but
beyond this differed widely. The Dawson route became nearly fixed after cart
roads were cut across various portages. At present a road 41 m. long runs from
Port Arthur to Shebandowan 1., thus avoiding the lower part of the old Kaministiquia
route altogether. (See Rep. Expl., etc., by S. J. Dawson, printed by
order of the Legislative Assembly, Toronto, 1859, folio,
maps.)
In 1804 an X. Y. house was passed within a mile above Fort William.
Before
1800 the route thus sketched was an "old" French waterway, which had been
abandoned and in a measure lost sight of by the English, who used the Pigeon
River route from Grand Portage ; but in 1797 it was tried and reopened by
Roderick McKenzie, with the result that headquarters were soon removed from
Grand Portage to the mouth of the Kaministiquia, and Fort William was
established :
Henry's text shows us this place in the building of it.