Beyond the island of St. Joseph we passed several islets of rock with fir-trees growing from the clefts.  Here, in summer, I was told, the Indians often set up their wigwams, and subsist by fishing.  There were none in sight as we passed, but we frequently saw on either shore the skeletons of the Chippewa habitations.  These consist, not like those of the Potawottamies, of a circle of sticks placed in the form of a cone, but of slender poles bent into circles, so as to make an almost regular hemisphere, over which, while it serves as a dwelling, birch-bark and mats of bulrushes are thrown.

On the western side of the passage, opposite to St. Joseph’s Island, stretches the long coast of Sugar Island, luxuriant with an extensive forest of the sugar-maple.  Here the Indians manufacture maple-sugar in the spring.  I inquired concerning their agriculture.

“They plant no corn nor squashes,” said a passenger, who had resided for some time at the Sault; “they will not ripen in this climate; but they plant potatoes in the sugar-bush, and dig them when the spring opens.  They have no other agriculture; they plant no beans as I believe the Indians do elsewhere.”

A violent squall of wind and rain fell upon the water just as we entered that broad part of the passage which bears the name of Muddy Lake.  In ordinary weather the waters are here perfectly pure and translucent, but now their agitation brought up the loose earth from the shallow bottom, and made them as turbid as the Missouri, with the exception of a narrow channel in the midst where the current runs deep.  Rocky hills now began to show themselves to the east of us; we passed the sheet of water known by the name of Lake George, and came to a little river which appeared to have its source at the foot of a precipitous ridge on the British side.  It is called Garden River, and a little beyond it, on the same side, lies Garden Village, inhabited by the Indians.  It was now deserted, the Indians having gone to attend a great assemblage of their race, held on one of the Manitoulin Islands, where they are to receive their annual payments from the British government.  Here were log-houses, and skeletons of wigwams, from which the coverings had been taken.  An Indian, when he travels, takes with him his family and his furniture, the matting for his wigwam, his implements for hunting and fishing, his dogs and cats, and finds a home wherever he finds poles for a dwelling.  A tornado had recently passed over the Garden Village.  The numerous girdled-trees which stood on its little clearing, had been twisted off midway or near the ground by the wind, and the roofs had, in some instances, been lifted from the cabins.