On The Afternoon Of The 2nd Of August We Commenced Our Journey, Having,
In Addition To Our Three Canoes, A
Smaller one to convey the women; we
were all in high spirits, being heartily glad that the time had at
Length
arrived when our course was to be directed towards the Copper-Mine River
and through a line of country which had not been previously visited by
any European. We proceeded to the northward along the eastern side of a
deep bay of the lake, passing through various channels formed by an
assemblage of rocky islands; and at sunset encamped on a projecting point
of the north main shore eight miles from Fort Providence. To the westward
of this arm, or bay of the lake, there is another deep bay that receives
the waters of a river which communicates with Great Marten Lake where the
North-West Company had once a post established. The eastern shores of the
Great Slave Lake are very imperfectly known: none of the traders have
visited them and the Indians give such loose and unsatisfactory accounts
that no estimation can be formed of its extent in that direction. These
men say there is a communication from its eastern extremity by a chain of
lakes with a shallow river which discharges its waters into the sea. This
stream they call the Thloueetessy, and report it to be navigable for
Indian canoes only. The forms of the south and western shores are better
known from the survey of Sir Alexander Mackenzie and in consequence of
the canoes having to pass and repass along these borders annually between
Moose-Deer Island and Mackenzie's River.
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