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 where the pretty and placid Gatineau joins its waters with the more turbulent main stream. Next he passes the bold promontory now known as Nepean Point, and immediately comes in sight of the beautiful verdure-clad hill on which the halls of Government of a new nation now stand, and resembling, more than aught else, a gem in its setting. Still contemplating the scene, this early explorer is now compelled to land, and to portage through the fringe of woods and the ledges of rock to reach the upper waters.



Accustomed as Champlain was to the tiny rivulets and miniature falls of the old world, we can understand the feelings of himself and his companions as they viewed for the first time the scene so well described by Francis Parkman, the American Historian, in "The Pioneers of France in the New World": "White as a snow-drift, the cataracts of the Chaudiere barred their way. They saw the unbridled river careering down its sheeted rocks, foaming in unfathomed chasms, wearying the solitude with the hoarse outcry of its agony and rage. On the brink of the rocky basin where the plunging torrent boiled like a caldron, and puffs of spray sprang out from its concussion like smoke from the throat of a cannon, Champlain's two Indians took their stand, and, with a loud invocation, threw tobacco into the foam—an offering to the local spirit, the Manitou of the cataract." Thence picking his way amongst the channels and rapids he passes from view. Champlain again ascended the Ottawa in 1616, and again in 1626 with the Jesuit Fathers Breboeuf and Lalement, who were subsequently tortured and burnt to death.

The hands of time moved on but slowly. For nearly 200 years the only visitors were trappers and traders who passed up and down the river, the