Volume 1

SUCCESSIVE BONNET PORTAGES. 33
we camped at L'Anse de Sable, where we found a few
Indians.
Au£;: ijtJi. As soon as day appeared, we embarked and
came to Petit Rocherdu Lac du Bonnet, a portage of about
40 paces ;
thence to Petit Rocher du Bonnet, which portage
is about 200 paces over ; thence to Portage du Bonnet,
which is almost two miles long." Having got all over, we
loaded and proceeded to Galet du Bonnet, which is about
Harmon, by error ;
it is also often translated Cap 1. , and this term is found as
Cat 1., by misprint. This water is simply an expansion of the main stream
which receives the Pinawa again, after the latter has flowed in a separate course
from that of the Winnipeg proper for a distance of about 18 m. The
great island thus inclosed is of irregularly oblong figure, with a length just
indicated, and an average breadth of perhaps 10 m. The long diameter is N.
andS. , with the Pinawa on the E., the Winnipeg on the S. and W., and
Bonnet 1. on the N. The expanse of water is mainly in Tp. 16 of ranges xi
and xii, E. of the principal meridian. The lake receives at its E. end a large
feeder from the N. E. This is Bird r., flowing through Bird, Snowshoe, and
other lakes ;
its F. name was R. Oiseau, easily mistaken for " Roseau" by a careless
engraver, whence " R. Roseau " on one of the maps before me ; another
map letters " R. L'Oisseur." The kind of bird for which the stream was
named seems to have been the eagle, to judge from the fact that Eagle r.
appears as its name on some maps. I suspect that McKenzie's explanation of
" Bonnet " as the name of the lake is fictitious ; that the " bonnet " in question
implies an Indian's head-dress of eagle's plumes ; and that, further, the name
Pinawa will be found to have the same implication ; but I am unable to show
that my suspicion is well founded. A much smaller feeder which Bonnet 1.
also receives near its E. end is Rat r., from a lake of the same name. The
main course of Winnipeg r. between the separation of the Pinawa and the expansion
of Bonnet 1. receives Whitemouth r. This is a large tributary, which
arises in and near Whitemouth 1., in the S. E. part of Provencher district of
Manitoba, and flows little W. of N. into Winnipeg r.
in Tp. 13, R. xi, E. of the
princ. merid. This river is crossed by the Dawson road (note **, p. 26) ; and
by the C. P. Ry. at Whitemouth sta.
also
^^ There is little conformity in records of the time in the nomenclature of
these several "Bonnet" portages, and the same may be said of the other
obstructions to navigation of whicli the above paragraph speaks. Henry's list
of names for the 13th, like that for the 12th, is the most particular one I
have seen, in print or in manuscript. His two first Petit Rocher portages are
the two galets of the same names which McKenzie gives as i^ m. apart, and
the two named Portages du Rocher du Bonnet d'en haut of Keating's list. The
main Bonnet portage, " almost two miles long," is given by Thompson as only
1,022 yards, by Keating as 1,760 yards, by McKenzie as " near half a league