Chapter XII: Waterways

One of the most remarkable features of Canada is the great number of lakes and rivers of all sizes, which interlace the land from east to west and north to south. Generally speaking, the country is divided into three great basins, the St. Lawrence and the Great Lakes, the Prairie, and the Pacific Slope.

The great lakes, five in number, form a chain of connected fresh-water seas leading to the Atlantic through the St. Lawrence River, and into them empty a great number of rivers and streams. The greatest of the lakes and farthest west is Superior, 380 miles long. It empties into Lake Huron by the St. Mary's River, where is situated the famous Sault Sainte Marie Rapids, and the town commonly known as the "Soo." Here the river is harnessed, and made to turn the wheels for large pulp and paper mills, while the vessels pass through canals, one on the Canadian and one on the American side.

Lake Michigan is wholly in the United States, and after passing Lake Huron, which is 250 miles long, we traverse the St. Clair River, Lake St. Clair, the smallest of the series, and the Detroit River, which brings us into Lake Erie, a large but rather shallow lake, with many important towns and cities on its shores. It is drained into Lake Ontario by the Niagara River, that broad and swift-flowing stream which, after careering down a long course of rapids, plunges over the world-famed Falls, 160 feet, to the rocks below, while the rainbow-tinted spray rises to a height from which it is seen for many miles. The white water hurries along, and rushes headlong through a narrow gorge of rock in a tempestuous rapid, then sweeps round the great basin of the whirlpool to hurry along to Lake Ontario, gradually calming itself as it flows. Famous as is the great cataract, the river has another claim to our interest, for here mankind has laid his heaviest burdens on Nature's shoulder, and day and night the angry river turns the wheels which produce 400,000 horse-power, and light the towns and draw the streetcars for a radius of a hundred miles. Navigation goes on between the two lakes by the Welland Canal, which has twenty-seven locks.

Lake Ontario empties the water of all this great chain by the St. Lawrence River; at its beginning are the Thousand Islands, a summer resort of wondrous beauty, which wealthy citizens from Canada and the United States have made into a fairyland. The mighty St. Lawrence, in its course to the sea, has several rapids, where canals have been built; but passenger vessels "shoot" the rapids on their way to Montreal, where is the head of ocean navigation. This waterway, 2,200 miles in length, is unparalleled in the world, and provides the natural highway for the commerce of the Continent. An endless procession of great iron vessels, in tows of three or four, drawn by one large steam barge, passes down the lakes laden with wheat, iron, coal, or timber. Beautifully equipped passenger vessels ply between the ports, offering trips from two hours to a week in duration, while the white sails of the fleets of many a yacht club are to be seen through the summer months.

The central, or prairie, basin has a large number of rivers, of which the best known are the Saskatchewan and the Assiniboine, running east to empty through the Nelson River into Hudson Bay, and the Peace, and the Mackenzie, which drain a number of large lakes to the Arctic Ocean. On the Pacific Slope are the Fraser and the Columbia, noted for the great salmon fisheries, and the gold found among their sands. When the salmon are running--that is, coming up the river--one sees the whole river bright with the gleam of their scales, and in shallow places even the flow of the water is impeded. Ten million fish are canned each year.

Curiously enough, all these water basins are connected, and in the early days, before the railway was dreamed of, Sir Alexander Mackenzie, a famous explorer, from whom the great Mackenzie River takes its name, traced out the water-route from the head of Lake Superior via the Saskatchewan and the Mackenzie River to the Arctic Ocean. When we trace up the Saskatchewan, we find it beginning in the Rockies in one branch of a little stream; the other branch runs west to the Pacific by the Columbia River. With the hand, one can direct the water now to the setting, now to the rising, sun. The drops beginning together reach the ocean thousands of miles apart. This is known as the "Great Divide." Though the coming of the steam-engine has made this route of little value, still the hunter or tourist may trace his sinuous path for weeks or months over this silver network.