But Fall Portage was only a culmination, in this fiercely rushing Trout River, for above it a dozen rapids are to be passed with toilsome energy.  After this the party is rewarded with beautiful islets, and the lake for a length of thirty-five miles lies in a fertile tract of country.  It was formerly appropriately called Holy Lake, and as a summit lake suggests to the traveller abiding restfulness.  To the traders on their route whether passing up or down the water courses, it was always so.  After the long and tedious voyaging it was their Elysium.  Not only are the sweet surroundings of the lake most charming, but the Indians of the neighborhood have always been noted for their good character, their docility and their industry.

[Illustration:  Andrew McDERMOTT, ESQ., Greatest Merchant of the Red River Settlement.  Came to Red River Settlement in 1813.  Died in Winnipeg in 1881.]

A short delay at Oxford House led to the continuation of the journey over what was now the roughest, most desolate, and most trying part of the voyage.  On this rough passage, perhaps the most distressing spot was “Windy Lake,” a small but tempestuous sheet.  The voyageurs declare that they never cross “Lac de Vent” without encountering high winds and very often dangerous storms.  Again “the Real Hill Difficulty” is encountered above the lake at the “Big Hill” portage and rapids—­one of the sudden descents of this alarming stream.  Those coming toward Oxford Lake run it at the very risk of their lives, but the painful portages impress themselves on all going up the “Height of Land,” which is reached after passing through a narrow gorge between hills and mountains of rocks, the stream dashing headlong down from the mile-long Robinson Portage.

This region is an elevated, rugged waste, with no signs of animal life about it.  It is the terror of the voyageurs.  This eerie tract culminates in the ascending “Haute de Terre,” as the French call it—­the dividing ridge between the waters running eastward to Hudson Bay and those running westward and descending to meet the Nelson River, on its headlong way to Hudson Bay as well.  The obstacle known as the “Painted Stone” being passed the Colonists’ brigade was now on its way to the inland plain of the Continent.

The portage led from this string of five small lakes to the head waters of a trifling, but very interesting stream called the “Echimamish River.”  A doubtful but curious explanation has been given of the name.  On the stream are ten beaver dams; which ever of these filled first gave the voyageur the opportunity to launch in his canoe or boat and go down the little runway to Black Water Creek.  It was said that in consequence it was called “Each-a-Man’s” brook, according as each voyageur took the water with his craft first.  The way was now clear, down stream until shortly was seen the dashing Nelson River, or as it is here called, “The Sea River.”  When this was accomplished the Immigrants had only to pull stoutly up stream for forty miles or more until Norway House, the great Hudson’s Bay Fort at the north end of Lake Winnipeg was reached.