Thousand paces, which occupied the crews
seven hours, we embarked on a small stream running towards the north-west
which carried us to the lake where Akaitcho proposed that we should pass
the winter. The officers ascended several of the loftiest hills in the
course of the day, prompted by a natural anxiety to examine the spot
which was to be their residence for many months. The prospect however was
not then the most agreeable as the borders of the lake seemed to be
scantily furnished with wood and that of a kind too small for the
purposes of building.
We perceived the smoke of a distant fire which the Indians suppose had
been made by some of the Dog-Ribbed tribe who occasionally visit this
part of the country.
Embarking at seven next morning we paddled to the western extremity of
the lake and there found a small river which flows out of it to the
South-West. To avoid a strong rapid at its commencement we made a portage
and then crossed to the north bank of the river where the Indians
recommended that the winter establishment should be erected, and we soon
found that the situation they had chosen possessed all the advantages we
could desire. The trees were numerous and of a far greater size than we
had supposed them to be in a distant view, some of the pines being thirty
or forty feet high and two feet in diameter at the root. We determined on
placing the house on the summit of the bank which commands a beautiful
prospect of the surrounding country. The view in the front is bounded at
the distance of three miles by round-backed hills; to the eastward and
westward lie the Winter and Round-rock Lakes which are connected by the
Winter River whose banks are well clothed with pines and ornamented with
a profusion of mosses, lichens, and shrubs.
In the afternoon we read divine service and offered our thanksgiving to
the Almighty for His goodness in having brought us thus far on our
journey; a duty which we never neglected when stationary on the Sabbath.
The united length of the portages we had crossed since leaving Fort
Providence is twenty-one statute miles and a half and, as our men had to
traverse each portage four times, with a load of one hundred and eighty
pounds, and return three times light, they walked in the whole upwards of
one hundred and fifty miles. The total length of our voyage from
Chipewyan is five hundred and fifty-three miles.*
(*Footnote.
Stony and Slave Rivers: 260 statute miles.
Slave Lake: 107 statute miles.
Yellow-Knife River: 156.5 statute miles.
Barren country between the source of the Yellow-Knife River and Fort
Enterprise: 29.5 statute miles.
Total: 553 statute miles.)
A fire was made on the south side of the river to inform the chief of our
arrival, which, spreading before a strong wind, caught the whole wood,
and we were completely enveloped in a cloud of smoke for the three
following days.
On the next morning our voyagers were divided into two parties, the one
to cut the wood for the building of a storehouse and the other to fetch
the meat as the hunters procured it. An interpreter was sent with
Keskarrah the guide to search for the Indians who had made the fire seen
on Saturday, from whom we might obtain some supplies of provision. An
Indian was also despatched to Akaitcho with directions for him to come to
this place directly and bring whatever provision he had as we were
desirous of proceeding without delay to the Copper-Mine River. In the
evening our men brought in the carcasses of seven reindeer which two
hunters had shot yesterday and the women commenced drying the meat for
our journey. We also obtained a good supply of fish from our nets today.
A heavy rain on the 23rd prevented the men from working either at the
building or going for meat; but on the next day the weather was fine and
they renewed their labours. The thermometer that day did not rise higher
than 42 degrees and it fell to 31 degrees before midnight. On the morning
of the 25th we were surprised by some early symptoms of the approach of
winter; the small pools were frozen over and a flock of geese passed to
the southward. In the afternoon however a fog came on which afterwards
changed into rain and the ice quickly disappeared. We suffered great
anxiety all the next day respecting John Hepburn who had gone to hunt
before sunrise on the 25th and had been absent ever since. About four
hours after his departure the wind changed and a dense fog obscured every
mark by which his course to the tents could be directed, and we thought
it probable he had been wandering in an opposite direction to our
situation as the two hunters who had been sent to look for him returned
at sunset without having seen him. Akaitcho arrived with his party and we
were greatly disappointed at finding they had stored up only fifteen
reindeer for us. St. Germain informed us that, having heard of the death
of the chief's brother-in-law, they had spent several days in bewailing
his loss instead of hunting. We learned also that the decease of this man
had caused another party of the tribe, who had been sent by Mr. Wentzel
to prepare provision for us on the banks of the Copper-Mine River, to
remove to the shores of the Great Bear Lake, distant from our proposed
route. Mortifying as these circumstances were they produced less painful
sensations than we experienced in the evening by the refusal of Akaitcho
to accompany us in the proposed descent of the Copper-Mine River.
