This Man Was Very Particular In His
Inquiries Respecting The Direction Of The House And The Course We Meant
To
Pursue; he also said that if he should be able he would go and search
for Vaillant and Credit; and
He requested my permission to take
Vaillant's blanket if he should find it, to which I agreed and mentioned
it in my notes to the officers.
Scarcely were these arrangements finished before Perrault and Fontano
were seized with a fit of dizziness and betrayed other symptoms of
extreme debility. Some tea was quickly prepared for them and after
drinking it and eating a few morsels of burnt leather they recovered and
expressed their desire to go forward, but the other men, alarmed at what
they had just witnessed, became doubtful of their own strength and,
giving way to absolute dejection, declared their inability to move. I now
earnestly pressed upon them the necessity of continuing our journey as
the only means of saving their own lives as well as those of our friends
at the tent, and after much entreaty got them to set out at ten A.M.
Belanger and Michel were left at the encampment and proposed to start
shortly afterwards. By the time we had gone about two hundred yards
Perrault became again dizzy and desired us to halt which we did until he,
recovering, offered to march on. Ten minutes more had hardly elapsed
before he again desired us to stop and, bursting into tears, declared he
was totally exhausted and unable to accompany us farther.
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