OLD FORT RELIANCE TO FORT RESOLUTION
All night the storm of rain and snow raged around our camp on
the south shore of Artillery Lake, but we were up and away in the
morning in spite of it. That day, we covered five portages (they
took two days in coming out). Next day we crossed Lake Harry and
camped three-quarters of a mile farther on the long portage. Next
day, September 11, we camped (still in storm) at the Lobstick Landing
of Great Slave Lake. How tropically rich all this vegetation looked
after the "Land of little sticks." Rain we could face, but high
winds on the big water were dangerous, so we were storm-bound until
September 14, when we put off, and in two hours were at old Fort
Reliance, the winter quarters of Sir George Back in 1833-4. In the
Far North the word "old" means "abandoned" and the fort, abandoned
long ago, had disappeared, except the great stone chimneys. Around
one of these that intrepid explorer and hunter-Buffalo Jones-had
built a shanty in 1897. There it stood in fairly good condition,
a welcome shelter from the storm which now set in with redoubled
fury. We soon had the big fireplace aglow and, sitting there in
comfort that we owed to him, and surrounded by the skeletons of
the Wolves that he had killed about the door in that fierce winter
time, we drank in hot and copious tea the toast: Long life and
prosperity to our host so far away, the brave old hunter, "Buffalo
Jones."
The woods were beautiful and abounded with life, and the three
days we spent there were profitably devoted to collecting, but on
September 17 we crossed the bay, made the short portage, and at
night camped 32 miles away, on the home track.
Next morning we found a camp of Indians down to the last of their
food. We supplied them with flour and tobacco. They said that
no Caribou had come to the Lake, showing how erratic is the great
migration.
In the afternoon we came across another band in still harder luck.
They had nothing whatever but the precarious catch of the nets,
and this was the off-season. Again we supplied them, and these were
among the unexpected emergencies for which our carefully guarded
supplies came in.
In spite of choppy seas we made from 30 to 35 miles a day, and
camped on Tal-thel-lay the evening of September 20. That night as
I sat by the fire the moon rose in a clear sky and as I gazed on
her calm bright disc something seemed to tell me that at that moment
the dear ones far away were also looking on that radiant face.
On the 21st we were storm-bound at Et-then Island, but utilised
the time collecting.
