The officers joined in the sport and
the numerous overturns we experienced formed no small share of the
amusement of the party, but on one occasion, when I had been thrown from
my seat and almost buried in the snow, a fat Indian woman drove her
sledge over me and sprained my knee severely.
On the 18th at eight in the evening a beautiful halo appeared round the
sun when it was about 8 degrees high. The colours were prismatic and very
bright, the red next the sun.
On the 21st the ice in the river was measured and found to be five feet
thick and, in setting the nets in Round Rock Lake, it was there
ascertained to be six feet and a half thick, the water being six fathoms
deep. The stomachs of some fish were at this time opened by Dr.
Richardson and found filled with insects which appear to exist in
abundance under the ice during the winter.
On the 22nd a moose-deer was killed at the distance of forty-five miles;
St. Germain went for it with a dog-sledge and returned with unusual
expedition on the morning of the third day. This supply was soon
exhausted and we passed the 27th without eating, with the prospect of
fasting a day or two longer, when old Keskarrah entered with the
unexpected intelligence of having killed a deer. It was divided betwixt
our own family and the Indians and during the night a seasonable supply
arrived from Akaitcho. Augustus returned with the men who brought it,
much pleased with the attention he had received from the Indians during
his visit to Akaitcho.
Next day Mr. Wentzel set out with every man that we could spare from the
fort for the purpose of bringing meat from the Indians as fast as it
could be procured. Dr. Richardson followed them two days afterwards to
collect specimens of the rocks in that part of the country. On the same
day the two Belangers arrived from Fort Providence having been only five
days on the march from thence.
The highest temperature in April was plus 40 degrees, the lowest minus 32
degrees, the mean plus 4.6 degrees. The temperature of the rapid,
examined on the 30th by Messrs. Back and Hood, was 32 degrees at the
surface, 33 degrees at the bottom.
On the 7th of May Dr. Richardson returned. He informed me that the
reindeer were again advancing to the northward but that the leader had
been joined by several families of old people and that the daily
consumption of provision at the Indian tents was consequently great. This
information excited apprehensions of being very scantily provided when
the period of our departure should arrive.
