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WATERWAYS OF WESTWARD EXPANSION

bark on it when anything considerable of ice is in it.

"If at any time you are obliged to bring to on account of the ice, great circumspection should be used in the choice of a place to lie in; there are many places where the shore projecting to a point, throws off the cakes of ice towards the middle of the river, and forms a kind of harbour below. By bringing to in such a situation, and fixing your canoe above the boat, with one end strongly to the shore, and the other out in the stream sloping down the river, so as to drive out such masses of ice as would otherwise accumulate on the upper side of your boat, and tend to sink her and drive her from her moorings, you may lie with a tolerable degree of safety.—This is a much better method than that of felling a tree on the shore above, so as to fall partly into the river, for if in felling it, it does not adhere in some measure to the trunk, or rest sufficiently on the bank, the weight of accumulated ice will be apt to send it adrift, and bring it down, ice and all, on the boat, when no safety can be expected for it. The reflection here naturally occurs, how