Interpreters:
Pierre St. Germain, Jean Baptiste Adam, Chipewyan Bois Brules.)
Our observations place Fort Providence in latitude 62 degrees 17 minutes
19 seconds North, longitude 114 degrees 9 minutes 28 seconds West; the
variation of the compass is 33 degrees 35 minutes 55 seconds East and the
dip of the needle 86 degrees 38 minutes 02 seconds.
It is distant from
Moose-Deer Island sixty-six geographic miles. This is the last
establishment of the traders in this direction, but the North-West
Company have two to the northward of it on the Mackenzie River. It has
been erected for the convenience of the Copper and Dog-Rib Indians who
generally bring such a quantity of reindeer meat that the residents are
enabled, out of their superabundance, to send annually some provision to
the fort at Moose-Deer Island. They also occasionally procure moose and
buffalo meat, but these animals are not numerous on this side of the
lake. Few furs are collected. Les poissons inconnus, trout, pike, carp,
and white-fish are very plentiful, and on these the residents principally
subsist. Their great supply of fish is procured in the latter part of
September and the beginning of October, but there are a few taken daily
in the nets during the winter. The surrounding country consists almost
entirely of coarse-grained granite, frequently enclosing large masses of
reddish felspar. These rocks form hills which attain an elevation of
three hundred or four hundred feet about a mile behind the house; their
surface is generally naked but in the valleys between them grow a few
spruce, aspen, and birch trees, together with a variety of shrubs and
berry-bearing plants.
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