Canada -- Description and travel; United States -- Description and travel
Sailing down the river, group after group of big and little green
islands are passed, the winding route and tortuous channels marked by
diminutive lighthouses and beacons, while nearly every island has its
cottages and often ornate and elaborate villas. Everywhere the shores
appear to be granite rocks, bright green foliage varying with the
darker evergreens surmounting them. All the waters are brilliantly
green and clear as crystal, rippled by breezes laden with balsamic
odors from the adjacent forests. Attractive cottages everywhere
appear, with little attendant boat-houses down by the water side, and
canoes and skiffs are in limitless supply, as the chief travelling is
by them. Everything seems to be full of life; in all directions are
pleasant views, the surface is dotted with pleasure-boats and
white-sailed yachts, the whole region being semi-amphibious, and its
people spending as much time on the water as on the land. The river,
too, is a great highway of commerce among these islands, many large
vessels passing along, and timber rafts guided by puffing little tugs.
Much of the product of the Canadian forests is thus taken to market, a
good deal going to Europe, and the sentimental and often musical
Metis, who live aboard in huts or tents, are the raftsmen, working the
broad sails and big steering-paddles on the tedious floating journey
down to Quebec. There are many large hotels, and the big one on Round
Island is named for Louis XIV.'s chivalrous and fiery Governor of
Canada, Count de Frontenac. His remains are buried in the Basilica at
Quebec, and his heart, enclosed in a leaden casket, was sent home to
his widow in France. She was much younger, and, evidently piqued at
some of his alleged love affairs, refused to receive it, saying she
would not have a dead heart which had not been hers while living. The
Baptists have a summer settlement on Round Island, and a short
distance below the extensive Wellesley Island has on its upper end the
popular Methodist summer town of the Thousand Island Park, where
little cottages and tents around the great Tabernacle often take care
of ten thousand people. Upon the lower end the Presbyterians have
established their attractive resort, Westminster Park, which faces
Alexandria Bay.
ALEXANDRIA BAY.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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