Having embarked, the troops and Indians paddled down stream to Lake Erie, reaching it in a snowstorm, and when a lull came they struck boldly across the lake, making what bateau men still call a "traverse" of thirty-six miles to the mouth of the Maumee. Darkness overtook them while still on the lake, and the head boats hung out lights for the guidance of those astern; but about midnight a gale came up, and the whole flotilla was nearly swamped, being beached with great difficulty on an oozy flat close to the mouth of the Maumee. The waters of the Maumee were low, and the boats were poled slowly up against the current, reaching the portage point, where there was a large Indian village, on the 24th of the month. Here a nine miles' carry was made to one of the sources of the Wabash, called by the voyageurs "la petite rivière." This stream was so low that the boats could not have gone down it had it not been for a beaver dam four miles below the landing-place, which backed up the current. An opening was made in the dam to let the boats pass. The traders and Indians thoroughly appreciated the help given them at this difficult part of the course by the engineering skill of the beavers--for Hamilton was following the regular route of the hunting, trading, and war parties,--and none of the beavers of this particular dam were ever molested, being left to keep their dam in order, and repair it, which they always speedily did whenever it was damaged. [Footnote: Haldimand's MSS. Hamilton's "brief account."]