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Lake Penage Page 2 or plume, because of its outline, which on a map resembles a feather with its main stem and many little indentations. It was only a short distance to the portage but it seemed rather long and tiresome. Panache is the largest of the chain of lakes, being about eighteen miles long. It was lovely, as all were then, but I believe the bush around it has since been burned. We have been fortunate in not having any rough weather so far. But there was quite a little breeze on Panache so our men decided to put up a sail, using the piece of awning i fastened to a couple of paddles, which had to be held up by hand. We flew along merrely for ‘:‘ a while, but as the breeze became a wind it had to be lowered and we went back to paddling, even that became alarming as the wind increased, Lake Panache can work up quite a sea. Mrs. Ross tried torquiet my fears by saying that Indians never ran risks, but I didn‘t see how they could aboid it when caught out in the middle of a large lake. Yesterday they had been whistling for wind, now they had too much, but being accustomed to canoes all their lives they managed very well, and I got more confidence, though some of the breakers were pretty big and heavy.. I noticed the men in the bow every little while shouted something back to the men in the stern. It always sounded the same so I asked Mrs. Ross what he was saying. She said he was warning the men in the stern of the big waves coming and as they usually followed each other in threes he would call out "one again, one again, one again", so they could be prepared to prevent the canoe from turning broadside on. This was all very well, but I was glad when we reached the portage which would lead us to the Whitefish River, and that would lead us to Georgian Bay." Unquote. [ This waterway is of course, no longer used as a highway but traveled only by the more adventurous souls longing to get away from it all. ~ When the wealth of the furs was depleted, then the lumbermen came. The axe of the woodsman ringing in the crisp winter air, the cry of "timber", the logs hauled to the ice to lie in wait until the spring thaw. Then the floods, water gloriously gushdng, glad to | be free of its icy hands but still its burdens of logs to be carried on and out of the lakes, down to the sawmills. The tough riverman with his pike pole and caulked boats guiding the logs to the mill pond to repose ther anticipating the ringing blade of the saw. These . logging operations were carried out by various companies. The Victoria Harbour, The Saginaw, and Hopen Lumber Companies.were amoung those remembered. The logs were floated out the west end of the lake and carried by the course of water to the sawmills at Little Current. No signs of these operations remain except a sunken scow around which black bass lurk. All the trails, skidways, mill sites, scars of man‘s domination over nature have been obliterated by nature who always wins the battle finally. Most of these lumbering operations took place from the beginning of the century until in the éarly 1920‘s. Most of the timber had been garnered by this time.