villages were sometimes found; but as a rule portages were not largely inhabited unless they were defended, and that was not until the era of military occupation.
The portages were frequently used as burying grounds by the Indians, and beside the little paths around the rapids of the river lies the dust of hundreds swept away to their death by the boiling waters. The portages were not infrequently on high, dry ground, favorable for interment.
Here, too, on the portages the toiling missionaries were wont to pause and erect their crosses and altars. In the long journeys back and forth from Quebec to the land of the Hurons, for instance, the portage paths of the Ottawa and St. Lawrence became familiar ground; where one had raised an altar another would be glad to pray. There were silent, holy places on these little roads by which we run noisily today—we who know little of the suffering, the devotion, and the piety of those who first walked and worshiped here.
The missionaries called the Indian trails "Roads of Iron" to suggest the fatigue and suffering endured in their rough jour-
