Notes on the geography and geology of Lake Huron / by John J. Bigsby.

  • Bigsby, John J. (John Jeremiah), 1792-1881.
Date:
1824
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Notes on the geography and geology of Lake Huron / by John J. Bigsby. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

    10/54 (page 182)
    Having- completed my geographical observations on the Manitoulines, I shall now proceed to describe the three principal divisions of Lake Huron. The north-west arm of Lake Huron, which communicates with Lake Su- perior, is of an oblong shape, the two longer sides at their western extremities converging towards the north. It contains about 400 square miles, and is crowded with islands of all magnitudes. The principal of these is St. Joseph. It is 65 miles in circumference; and, together with the large Sugar Island, is wedged into the end of the channel from Lake Superior, scarcely allowing at the narrowest points the breadth of a mile to the sum of the three outlets from Lake George. St. Joseph is somewhat triangular in its form, its north and east sides meet- ing almost at right angles. Although an undulating ridge called the Highlands of St. Joseph, about 500 feet high, is found throughout the island at the distance of a few miles from the lake, yet the surface is not so broken as that of the Manitoulines; and the whole is better wooded. It has few or no precipices, but it is singularly loaded with the debris of foreign rocks. Its southern point, a picturesque cleared mound, once the site of a military post called Fort St. Joseph, and lately occupied by the British garrison at Collier’s Harbour for pasturage, is only six miles from Drummond. The north-west point of the island is 26 miles from this mound, in long. 84° and lat. 46° 18'; and the eastern angle lies about 18 miles north-north-east of it by the ship’s course. The waters on the north, west, and south-west of St. Joseph have received distinct appellations. That on the south, bounded also by Drummond, is a large irregularly shaped archipelago, containing sixty-one islands and many shoals. The part of Lake Huron included between the north-cast shore of St. Jo- seph and the contiguous main, is called the Channel of Pelletau, from the name of a solitary Canadian residing on an isle at its east end. Except towards the western extremity, this channel is almost a clear sheet of water, from 10 to 12 miles long, 6 miles broad at the east end, and about a mile and a half at the west. On the two sides of this channel the aspect of the country is very- different. On the south, the verdant acclivities of St. Joseph are trending to the north-west in two large bays. On the north are the black and denuded fastnesses of the main land; an assemblage of greenstone mounds, swamps, and ponds; with the margin of the lake fringed with reefs and rocky islets. Near the west end, Pelletau’s Channel widens into an expanse of 25 square miles, and becomes full of islands, three of which are much larger than the rest; and of these the largest is high, compact, and woody, and nearly blocks