The more I looked upon those glancing, dancing rapids, the more resolute
I grew to venture myself in the midst of them. George Johnston went to
seek a fit canoe and a dextrous steersman, and meantime I strolled away
to pay a visit to Wayish,ky's family, and made a sketch of their lodge,
while pretty Zah,gah,see,gah,qua, held the umbrella to shade me.
The canoe being ready, I went up to the top of the portage, and we
launched into the river. It was a small fishing canoe about ten feet
long, quite new, and light and elegant and buoyant as a bird on the
waters. I reclined on a mat at the bottom, Indian fashion (there are no
seats in a genuine Indian canoe); in a minute we were within the verge
of the rapids, and down we went, with a whirl and a splash!--the white
surge leaping around me--over me. The Indian with astonishing dexterity
kept the head of the canoe to the breakers, and somehow or other we
danced through them. I could see, as I looked over the edge of the
canoe, that the passage between the rocks was sometimes not more than
two feet in width, and we had to turn sharp angles--a touch of which
would have sent us to destruction--all this I could see through the
transparent eddying waters, but I can truly say, I had not even a
momentary sensation of fear, but rather of giddy, breathless, delicious
excitement. I could even admire the beautiful attitude of a fisher, past
whom we swept as we came to the bottom. The whole affair, from the
moment I entered the canoe till I reached the landing place, occupied
seven minutes, and the distance is about three quarters of a mile.[41]
[Footnote 41: "The total descent of the Fall of St. Mary's has been
ascertained to be twenty-two and a half perpendicular feet. It has been
found impracticable to ascend the rapid; but canoes have ventured down,
though the experiment is extremely nervous and hazardous, and avoided by
a portage, two miles long, which connects the navigable parts of the
strait."--_Bouchette's Canada._]