breaking through a
backward rolling billow, without a word spoken, but with every now and
again a quick convulsive twist and turn of the bow-paddle to edge far off
some rock, to put her full through some boiling billow, to hold her
steady down the slope of some thundering chute which has the power of a
thousand horses: for remember, this river of rapids, this Winnipeg, is no
mountain torrent, no brawling brook, but over every rocky ledge and
"wave-worn precipice" there rushes twice a vaster volume than Rhine
itself pours forth. The rocks which strew the torrent are frequently the
most trifling of the dangers of the descent, formidable though they
appear to the stranger. Sometimes a huge boulder will stand full in the
midst of the channel, apparently presenting an obstacle from which escape
seems impossible. The canoe is rushing full towards it, and no power can
save it--there is just one power that can do it, and the rock itself
provides it. Not the skill of man could run the boat bows on to that
rock. There is a wilder sweep of water rushing off the polished sides
than on to them, and the instant that we touch that sweep we shoot away
with redoubled speed. No, the rock is not as treacherous as the whirlpool
and twisting billow.

On the night of the 20th of August the whole of the regular troops of the
Expedition and the general commanding it and his staff had reached Fort
Alexander, at the mouth of the Winnipeg River. Some accidents had
occurred, and many had been the "close shaves" of rock and rapid, but no
life had been lost; and from the 600 miles of wilderness there emerged
400 soldiers whose muscles and sinews, taxed and tested by continuous
toil, had been developed to a pitch of excellence seldom equalled, and
whose appearance and physique--browned, tanned, and powerful told: of the
glorious climate of these Northern solitudes, It was near sunset when the
large canoe touched the wooden pier opposite the Fort Alexander and the
commander of the Expedition stepped on shore to meet his men, assembled
for the first time together since Lake Superior's distant sea had been
left behind. It-was a meeting not devoid of those associations which make
such things memorable, and the cheer which went up from the soldiers who
lined the steep bank to bid him welcome had in it a note of that sympathy
which binds men together by the inward consciousness of difficulties
shared in common and dangers--successfully overcome together. N