From what we saw, however, it was easy to
predict that thither would flow, in time, the stream of pioneer
life and the bustle of attending enterprise and trade.
Chapter II
Lesser Slave River And Lesser Slave Lake.
It is unnecessary to inform the average reader that the Lesser
Slave River connects the Lesser Slave Lake with the Athabasca;
any atlas will satisfy him upon that point. But its peculiar
colouring he will not find there, and it is this which gives
the river its most distinctive character. Once seen, it is easy
to account for the hue of the Athabasca below the Lesser Slave
River; for the water of the latter, though of a pale yellow colour
in a glass, is of a rich burnt umber in the stream, and when blown
upon by the wind turns its sparkling facets to the sun like the
smile upon the cheek of a brunette. Its upward course is like
a continuous letter S with occasional S's side by side, so that
a point can be crossed on foot in a few minutes which would
cost much time to go around. Its proper name, too, is not to
be found in the atlases, either English or French. There it
is called the Lesser Slave River, but in the classic Cree its
name is Iyaghchi Eennu Sepe, or the River of the Blackfeet,
literally the "River of the Strange People." The lake itself
bears the same name, and even now is never called Slave Lake
by the Indians in their own tongue. This fact, to my mind,
casts additional light upon an obscure prehistoric question,
namely, the migration of the great Algic, or Algonquin, race.
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