Being Thus Deprived Of Our Principal Resource, That Of Fishing, And The Men Evidently Getting Weaker Every Day, It Became Necessary To Lighten Their Burdens Of Everything Except Ammunition, Clothing, And The Instruments That Were Required To Find Our Way.

I therefore issued directions to deposit at this encampment the dipping needle, azimuth compass, magnet, a large thermometer, and a few books we had carried, having torn out of these such parts as we should require to work the observations for latitude and longitude.

I also promised, as an excitement to the efforts in hunting, my gun to St. Germain, and an ample compensation to Adam or any of the other men who should kill any animals. Mr. Hood on this occasion lent his gun to Michel the Iroquois, who was very eager in the chase and often successful.

September 14.

This morning, the officers being assembled round a small fire, Perrault presented each of us with a small piece of meat which he had saved from his allowance. It was received with great thankfulness, and such an act of self-denial and kindness being totally unexpected in a Canadian voyager filled our eyes with tears. In directing our course to a river issuing from the lake we met Credit who communicated the joyful intelligence of his having killed two deer in the morning. We instantly halted and, having shared the deer that was nearest to us, prepared breakfast. After which the other deer was sent for and we went down to the river, which was about three hundred yards wide and flowed with great velocity through a broken rocky channel.

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