is equal to any in its very agreeable taste as a f18o4 drinking water. The general breadth of the lNove river to day has been about 80 yards, altho' in certain places not above one half of this quantity. We now find immense beaches of gravel and sand, over which the river passes, in the season of its floods with the rapidity of a torrent, carrying with it vast quantities of drift wood which are in many places piled up in prodigious masses, lying 20 feet above the present level of the water, and points out to us already the danger of ascending or descending this river in certain degrees of its floods: accidents nevertheless are rare with the canoes of the Country; ours is the first barge of so large a size that ever ascended this river: passed a very intricate rapid in the evening, which we could not get up untill we had carried a rope ashore. Encamped upon an elevated gravel beach: Therm! at 8h p.m. 540 Extremes 400—68? Made this day 14 miles 317 perches.*
This day an unlucky accident happened, which was very nigh being extremely serious. Doctor Hunter was employed in the cabin of the boat loading one of his pistols; he held it between his legs upon a bench with his head almost
* It must be expected that imperfections in our reckoning must arise from the retardments and difficulties met with on the rapids and shoals; compensations for lost time and rate of going are made at the moment when the best judgement can be formed.