Read Ebook: Adventurers of the Far North: A Chronicle of the Frozen Seas by Leacock Stephen

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The journey opened gloomily enough. The month of December was spent in toiling painfully over the barren grounds. The sledges were insufficient, and Hearne as well as his companions had to trudge under the burden of a heavy load. At best some sixteen or eighteen miles could be traversed in the short northern day. Intense cold set in. Game seemed to have vanished, and Christmas found the party plodding wearily onward, foodless, moving farther each day from the little outpost of civilization that lay behind them on the bleak shores of Hudson Bay.

I must confess that I never spent so dull a Christmas; and when I recollected the merry season which was then passing, and reflected on the immense quantities and great variety of delicacies which were then expending in every part of Christendom, I could not refrain from wishing myself again in Europe, if it had only been to have had an opportunity of alleviating the extreme hunger that I suffered with the refuse of the table of one of my acquaintances.

At the end of the month , they reached the woods, a thick growth of stunted pine and poplar with willow bushes growing in the frozen swamps. Here they joined a large party of Matonabbee's band, for the most part women and children. The women were by no means considered by the chief as a hindrance to the expedition. Indeed, he attributed Hearne's previous failure to their absence. 'Women,' he once told his English friend, 'were made for labour; one of them can carry or haul as much as two men can do; they pitch our tents, make and mend our clothing, and in fact there is no such thing as travelling in this country for any length of time without their assistance. Women,' he added, 'though they do everything are maintained at a trifling expense; for as they always stand cook, the very licking of their fingers in scarce times is sufficient for their subsistence.' Acting on these salutary opinions, the chief was a man of eight wives, and Hearne was shocked later on to find the Indian willing to add to his little flock by force without the slightest compunction.

The two opening months of the year 1771 were spent in travelling westward towards Wholdaia Lake. The country was wooded, though here and there, the observer, standing on the higher levels, could see the barren grounds to the northward. The cold was intense, especially when a frozen lake or river exposed the travellers to the full force of the wind. But game was plentiful. At intervals the party halted and killed caribou in such quantities that three and four days were sometimes spent in camp in a vain attempt to eat the spoils of the chase. The Indians, Hearne remarked, slaughtered the game recklessly, with no thought of the morrow.

Wholdaia Lake was reached on March 2. This is a long sheet of water lying some thirty miles north of the parallel of sixty degrees. At the point where Hearne crossed it on the ice, it was twenty-seven miles broad; its length appears to be four or five times as great. It is still almost unknown, for it lies far beyond the confines of present settlement and has been seen only by explorers.

From Wholdaia Lake the course was continued westward. The weather was moderate. There was abundant game, the skies overhead were bright, and the journey assumed a more agreeable aspect. Here and there bands of roving Indians were seen, as also were encampments of hunters engaged in snaring deer in the forest. In the middle of April, the party rested for ten days in camp beside a little lake which marked the westward limit of their march. From here on, the course was to lie northward again. The Indians were therefore employed in gathering staves and birch-bark to be used for tent poles and canoes when the party should again reach the barren grounds on their northern route.

The opening of May found the party at Lake Clowey, whose waters run westward to the Great Slave Lake. Here they again halted, and the Indians built birch-bark canoes out of the material they had carried from the woods. In traversing the barren grounds, where both the direction and the nature of the rivers render them almost useless for navigation, the canoe plays a part different from that which is familiar throughout the rest of Canada. During the greater part of the journey, often for a stretch of a hundred miles at a time, the canoe is absolutely useless, or worse, since it must be carried. Here and there, however, for the crossing of the larger rivers, it is indispensable. Large numbers of Indians were assembling at Clowey Lake during Hearne's stay there, and were likewise engaged in building canoes. A considerable body of them, hearing that Matonabbee and his band were on the way to the Coppermine, eagerly agreed to travel with them. It seemed to them an excellent opportunity for making a combined attack on their hereditary enemy, the Eskimos at the mouth of the river. The savages thereupon set themselves to make wooden shields about three feet long with which to ward off the arrows of the Eskimos.

The Copper Indians expressed their pleasure at learning from Hearne that the great king their father proposed to send ships to visit them by the northern sea. They had never seen a white man before and examined Hearne with great curiosity, disapproving strongly of the colour of his skin and comparing his hair to a stained buffalo tail.

The whole party moved on together. The weather was bad, with alternating sleet and rain, and the path broken and difficult. July 4 found them at the Stony Mountains, a rugged and barren set of hills that seemed from a distance like a pile of broken stones. Nine days more of arduous travel brought the warriors in sight of their goal. From the elevation of the low hills that rose above its banks, Hearne was able to look upon the foaming waters of the Coppermine, as it plunged over the broken stones of its bed in a series of cascades. A few trees, or rather a few burnt stumps, fringed the banks, but the trees which here and there remained unburned were so crooked and dwarfish as merely to heighten the desolation of the scene.

Immediately on their arrival at the Coppermine, Matonabbee and his Indians began to make their preparations for an attack upon the Eskimos, who were known to frequent the mouth of the river. Spies were sent out in advance towards the sea, and the remainder of the Indians showed an unwonted and ominous energy in building fires and roasting meat so that they might carry with them a supply so large as to make it unnecessary to alarm the Eskimos by the sound of the guns of the hunters in search of food. Hearne occupied himself with surveying the river. He was sick at heart at the scene of bloodshed which he anticipated, but was powerless to dissuade his companions from their design. Two days later , the spies brought back word that a camp of Eskimos, five tents in all, had been seen on the further side of the river. It was distant about twelve miles and favourably situated for a surprise. Matonabbee and his braves were now filled with the fierce eagerness of the savage; they crossed hurriedly to the west side of the river, where each Indian painted the shield that he carried with rude daubs of red and black, to imitate the spirits of the earth and air on whom he relied for aid in the coming fight. Noiselessly the Indians proceeded along the banks of the river, trailing in a serpentine course among the rocks so as to avoid being seen upon the higher ground. They seemed to Hearne to have been suddenly transformed from an undisciplined rabble into a united band. Northern and Copper Indians alike were animated by a single purpose and readily shared with one another the weapons of their common stock. The advance was made in the middle of the night, but at this season of the year the whole scene was brilliant with the light of the midnight sun. The Indians stole to within two hundred yards of the place indicated by the guides. From their ambush among the rocks they could look out upon the tents of their sleeping victims. The camp of the Eskimos stood on a broad ledge of rock at the spot where the Coppermine, narrowed between lofty walls of red sandstone, roars foaming over a cataract some three hundred yards in extent.

The Indians, sure of their prey, paused a few moments to make final preparations for the onslaught. They cast aside their outer garments, bound back their hair from their eyes, and hurriedly painted their foreheads and faces with a hideous coating of red and black. Then with weapons in hand they rushed forth upon their sleeping foe.

Hearne, unable to leave the spot, was compelled to witness in all its details the awful slaughter which followed.

In a few seconds the horrible scene commenced; it was shocking beyond description; the poor unhappy victims were surprised in the midst of their sleep, and had neither time nor power to make any resistance; men, women, and children, in all upwards of twenty, ran out of their tents stark naked, and endeavoured to make their escape; but the Indians, having possession of all the land-side, to no place could they fly for shelter. One alternative only remained, that of jumping into the river; but, as none of them attempted it, they all fell a sacrifice to Indian barbarity. The shrieks and groans of the poor expiring wretches were truly dreadful.

But it is needless to linger on the details of the massacre, which Hearne was thus compelled to witness, and the revolting mutilation of the corpses which followed it. To Matonabbee and the other Indians the whole occurrence was viewed as a proper incident of tribal war, and the feeble protests which Hearne contrived to make only drew down upon him the expression of their contempt.

After the massacre followed plunder. The Indians tore down the tents of the Eskimos and with reckless folly threw tents, tent poles, and great quantities of food into the waters of the cataract. Having made a feast of fresh fish on the ruins of the camp, they then announced to Hearne that they were ready to assist him in going on to the mouth of the river. The desolate scene was left behind--the broad rock strewn with mangled bodies of the dead and the broken remnants of their poor belongings. Half a century later the explorer Franklin visited the spot and saw the skulls and bones of the Eskimos still lying about. One of Franklin's Indians, then an aged man, had been a witness of the scene.

From the hills beside the Bloody Falls, as the cataract is called, the eye could discern at a distance of some eight miles the open water of the Arctic and the glitter of the ice beyond. Hearne followed the river along its precipitous and broken course till he stood upon the shore of the sea. One may imagine with what emotion he looked out upon that northern ocean to reach which he had braved the terrors of the Arctic winter and the famine of the barren grounds. He saw before him about three-quarters of a mile of open sea, studded with rocks and little islands: beyond that the clear white of the ice-pack stretched to the farthest horizon. Hearne viewed this scene in the bright sunlight of the northern day: but while he still lingered, thick fog and drizzling rain rolled in from the sea and shut out the view. For the sake of form, as he said, he erected a pile of stones and took possession of the coast in the name of the Hudson's Bay Company. Then, filled with the bitterness of a vain quest, Hearne turned his face towards the south to commence his long march to the settlements.

Up to this point nothing had been seen of the supposed mountains of copper which formed the principal goal of Hearne's undertaking. The eagerness of the Indians had led them to hasten directly to the camp of the Eskimos regardless of all else. But on the second day of the journey home, the guides led Hearne to the site of this northern Eldorado. It lay among the hills beside the Coppermine river at a spot thirty miles from the sea, and almost directly south of the mouth of the river. The prospect was strange. Some mighty force, as of an earthquake, seemed to have rent asunder the solid rock and strewn it in a confused and broken heap of boulders. Through these a rivulet ran to join the Coppermine. Here, said the Indians, was copper so great in quantity that it could be gathered as easily as one might gather stones at Churchill. Filled with a new eagerness, Hearne and his companions searched for four hours among the rocks. Here and there a few splinters of native copper were seen. One piece alone, weighing some four pounds, offered a slight reward for their quest. This Hearne carried away with him, convinced now that the mountain of copper and the inexhaustible wealth of the district were mere fictions created by the cupidity of the savages or by the natural mystery surrounding a region so grim and inaccessible as the rocky gorge by which the Coppermine rushes to the cold seas of the north.

After Hearne's visit no explorer reached the lower waters of the Coppermine till Captain Franklin made his memorable and marvellous overland journey of 1821. Since Franklin's time the region has been crossed only two or three times by explorers. They agree in stating that loose copper and copper ore are freely found. But it does not seem that, since 1771, any white man has ever looked upon the valley of the great boulders which the Indians described to Hearne as containing a fabulous wealth of copper. The solitary piece of metal which he brought home is still preserved by the Hudson's Bay Company.

On Christmas Eve Hearne found himself on the shores of a great frozen lake, so vast that, as the Indians rightly informed him, it reached three hundred miles east and west. This is the Great Slave Lake; Hearne speaks of it as Athaspuscow Lake. The latter name is the same as that now given to another lake --the word being descriptive and meaning the lake with the beds of reeds.

Hearne was not left without honour. The Hudson's Bay Company retained him in their service at various factories, and three years after his famous expedition they made him governor of Fort Prince of Wales. During his service there he had the melancholy celebrity of surrendering the great fort to a French fleet under Admiral La P?rouse. Among the spoils of the captors was Hearne's manuscript journal, which the generous victors returned on the sole condition that it should be published as soon as possible. Hearne returned to England in 1787, and was chiefly busied with revising and preparing his journal until his death in 1792.

No better appreciation of his work has been written than the words with which he concludes the account of his safe return after his years of wandering. 'Though my discoveries,' he writes, 'are not likely to prove of any material advantage to the nation at large, or indeed to the Hudson's Bay Company, yet I have the pleasure to think that I have fully complied with the orders of my masters, and that it has put a final end to all disputes concerning a North-West Passage through Hudson's Bay.'

Bag for flint and steel, tobacco, etc.

MACKENZIE DESCENDS THE GREAT RIVER OF THE NORTH

The general outline of the north of the continent of America, and at any rate the vast distance to be traversed to reach the Pacific from the Atlantic, could now be surmised with some accuracy. But the internal geography of the continent still contained an unsolved mystery. It was known that vast bodies of fresh water far beyond the basin of the Saskatchewan and the Columbia emptied towards the north. Hearne had revealed the existence of the Great Slave Lake, and the advance of daring fur-traders into the north had brought some knowledge of the great stream called the Peace, which rises far in the mountains of the west, and joins its waters to Lake Athabaska. It was known that this river after issuing from the Athabaska Lake moved onwards, as a new river, in a vast flood towards the north, carrying with it the tribute of uncounted streams. These rivers did not flow into the Pacific. Nor could so great a volume of water make its way to the sea through the shallow torrent of the Coppermine or the rivers that flowed north-eastward over the barren grounds. There must exist somewhere a mighty river of the north running to the frozen seas.

It fell to the lot of Alexander Mackenzie to find the solution of this problem. The circumstances which led to his famous journey arose out of the progress of the fur trade and its extension into the Far West. The British possession of Canada in 1760 had created a new situation. The monopoly enjoyed by the Hudson's Bay Company was rudely disturbed. Enterprising British traders from Montreal, passing up the Great Lakes, made their way to the valley of the Saskatchewan and, whether legally or not, contrived to obtain an increasing share of the furs brought from the interior. These traders were at first divided into partnerships and small groups, but presently, for the sake of co-operation and joint defence, they combined into the powerful body known as the North-West Company, which from now on entered into desperate competition with the great corporation that had first occupied the field. The Hudson's Bay Company and its rival sought to carry their operations as far inland as possible in order to tap the supplies at their source. They penetrated the valleys of the Assiniboine, the Red, and the Saskatchewan rivers, and founded, among others, the forts which were destined to become the present cities of Winnipeg, Brandon, and Edmonton. The annals of North-West Canada during the next thirty-three years are made up of the recital of the commercial rivalry, and at times the actual conflict under arms, of the two great trading companies.

It was in the service of the North-West Company that Alexander Mackenzie made his famous journey. He had arrived in Canada in 1779. After five years spent in the counting-house of a trading company at Montreal, he had been assigned for a year to a post at Detroit, and in 1785 had been elevated to the dignity of a bourgeois or partner in the North-West Company. In this capacity Alexander Mackenzie was sent out to the Athabaska district to take control, in that vast and scarcely known region, of the posts of the traders now united into the North-West Company.

A glance at the map of Canada will show the commanding geographical position occupied by Lake Athabaska, in a country where the waterways formed the only means of communication. It receives from the south and west the great streams of the Athabaska and the Peace, which thus connect it with the prairies of the Saskatchewan valley and with the Rocky Mountains. Eastward a chain of lakes and rivers connects it and the forest country which lies about it with the barren grounds and the forts on Hudson Bay, while to the north, issuing from Lake Athabaska, a great and unknown river led into the forests, moving towards an unknown sea.

It was Mackenzie's first intention to make Lake Athabaska the frontier of the operations of his company. Acting under his instructions, his cousin Roderick Mackenzie, who served with him, selected a fine site on a cape on the south side of the lake and erected the post that was named Fort Chipewyan. Beautifully situated, with good timber and splendid fisheries and easy communication in all directions, the fort rapidly became the central point of trade and travel in the far north-west. But it was hardly founded before Mackenzie had already conceived a wider scheme. Chipewyan should be the emporium but not the outpost of the fur trade; using it as a base, he would descend the great unknown waterway which led north, and thus bring into the sphere of the company's operations the whole region between Lake Athabaska and the northern sea. Alexander Mackenzie's object was, in name at least, commercial--the extension of the trade of the North-West Company. But in reality, his incentive was that instinctive desire to widen the bounds of geographical knowledge, and to roll back the mystery of unknown lands and seas which had already raised Hearne to eminence, and which later on was to lead Franklin to his glorious disaster.

It was on Wednesday, June 3, 1789, that Alexander Mackenzie's little flotilla of four birch-bark canoes set out across Lake Athabaska on its way to the north. In Mackenzie's canoe were four French-Canadian voyageurs, two of them accompanied by their wives, and a German. Two other canoes were filled with Indians, who were to act as guides and interpreters. At their head was a notable brave who had been one of the band of Matonabbee, Hearne's famous guide. From his frequent visits to the English post at Fort Churchill he had acquired the name of the 'English Chief.' Another canoe was in charge of Leroux, a French-Canadian in the service of the company, who had already descended the Slave river, as far as the Great Slave Lake. Leroux and his men carried trading goods and supplies.

The first part of the journey was by a route already known. The voyageurs paddled across the twenty miles of water which here forms the breadth of Lake Athabaska, entered a river running from the lake, and followed its winding stream. They encamped at night seven miles from the lake. The next morning at four o'clock the canoes were on their way again, descending the winding river through a low forest of birch and willow. After a paddle of ten miles, a bend in the little river brought the canoes out upon the broad stream of the Peace river, its waters here being upwards of a mile wide and running with a strong current to the north. On our modern maps this great stream after it leaves Lake Athabaska is called the Slave river: but it is really one and the same mighty river, carrying its waters from the valleys of British Columbia through the gorges of the Rocky Mountains, passing into the Great Slave Lake, and then, under the name of the Mackenzie, emptying into the Arctic.

In the next five days Mackenzie's canoes successfully descended the river to the Great Slave Lake, a distance of some two hundred and thirty-five miles. The journey was not without its dangers. The Slave river has a varied course: at times it broadens out into a great sheet of water six miles across, flowing with a gentle current and carrying the light canoes gently upon its unruffled surface. In other places it is confined into a narrow channel, breaks into swift eddies and pours in boiling rapids over the jagged rocks. Over the upper rapids of the river, Mackenzie and his men were able to run their canoes fully laden; but lower down were long and arduous portages, rendered dangerous by the masses of broken ice still clinging to the banks of the river. As they neared the Great Slave Lake boisterous gales from the north-east lashed the surface of the river into foam and brought violent showers of rain. But the voyageurs were trained men, accustomed to face the dangers of northern navigation.

A week of travel brought them on June 9 to the Great Slave Lake. It was still early in the season. The rigour of winter was not yet relaxed. As far as the eye could see the surface of the lake presented an unbroken sheet of ice. Only along the shore had narrow lanes of open water appeared. The weather was bitterly cold, and there was no immediate prospect of the break-up of the ice.

For a fortnight Mackenzie and his party remained at the lake, skirting its shores as best they could, and searching among the bays and islands of its western end for the outlet towards the north which they knew must exist. Heavy rain, alternating with bitter cold, caused them much hardship. At times it froze so hard that a thin sheet of new ice covered even the open water of the lake. But as the month advanced the mass of old ice began slowly to break; strong winds drove it towards the north, and the canoes were presently able to pass, with great danger and difficulty, among the broken floes. Mackenzie met a band of Yellow Knife Indians, who assured him that a great river ran out of the west end of the lake, and offered a guide to aid him in finding the channel among the islands and sandbars of the lake. Convinced that his search would be successful, Mackenzie took all the remaining supplies into his canoes and sent back Leroux to Chipewyan with the news that he had gone north down the great river. But even after obtaining his guide Mackenzie spent four days searching for the outlet It was not till the end of the month of June that his search was rewarded, and, at the extreme south-west, the lake, after stretching out among islands and shallows, was found to contract into the channel of a river.

The first day of July saw Mackenzie's canoes floating down the stream that bears his name. From now on, progress became easier. At this latitude and season the northern day gave the voyageurs twenty hours of sunlight in each day, and with smooth water and a favouring current the descent was rapid. Five days after leaving the Great Slave Lake the canoes reached the region where the waters of the Great Bear Lake, then still unknown, drain into the Mackenzie. The Indians of this district seemed entirely different from those known at the trading posts. At the sight of the canoes and the equipment of the voyageurs they made off and hid among the rocks and trees beside the river. Mackenzie's Indians contrived to make themselves understood, by calling out to them in the Chipewyan language, but the strange Indians showed the greatest reluctance and apprehension, and only with difficulty allowed Mackenzie's people to come among them. Mackenzie notes the peculiar fact that they seemed unacquainted with tobacco, and that even fire-water was accepted by them rather from fear of offending than from any inclination. Knives, hatchets and tools, however, they took with great eagerness. On learning of Mackenzie's design to go on towards the north they endeavoured with every possible expression of horror to induce him to turn back. The sea, they said, was so far away that winter after winter must pass before Mackenzie could hope to reach it: he would be an old man before he could complete the voyage. More than this, the river, so they averred, fell over great cataracts which no one could pass; he would find no animals and no food for his men. The whole country was haunted by monsters. Mackenzie was not to be deterred by such childish and obviously interested terrors. His interpreters explained that he had no fear of the horrors that they depicted, and, by a heavy bribe, consisting of a kettle, an axe, and a knife, he succeeded in enlisting the services of one of the Indians as a guide. That the terror of the Far North professed by these Indians, or at any rate the terror of going there in strange company, was not wholly imaginary was made plain from the conduct of the guide. When the time came to depart he showed every sign of anxiety and fear: he sought in vain to induce his friends to take his place: finding that he must go, he reluctantly bade farewell to his wife and children, cutting off a lock of his hair and dividing it into three parts, which he fastened to the hair of each of them.

On July 5, the party set out with their new guide, and on the same afternoon passed the mouth of the Great Bear river, which joins the Mackenzie in a flood of sea-green water, fresh, but coloured like that of the ocean. Below this point, they passed many islands. The banks of the river rose to high mountains covered with snow. The country, so the guide said, was here filled with bears, but the voyageurs saw nothing worse than mosquitoes, which descended in clouds upon the canoes. As the party went on to the north, the guide seemed more and more stricken with fear and consumed with the longing to return to his people. In the morning after breaking camp nothing but force would induce him to embark, and on the fourth night, during the confusion of a violent thunder-storm, he made off and was seen no more.

The next day, however, Mackenzie supplied his place, this time by force, from a band of roving Indians. The new guide told him that the sea was not far away, and that it could be reached in ten days. As the journey continued the river was broken into so many channels and so dotted with islands, that it was almost impossible to decide which was the main waterway. The guide's advice was evidently influenced by his desire to avoid the Eskimos, and, like his predecessor, to keep away from the supposed terrors of the North. The shores of the river were now at times low, though usually lofty mountains could be seen about ten miles away. Trees were still present, especially fir and birch, though in places both shores of the river were entirely bare, and the islands were mere banks of sand and mud to which great masses of ice adhered. An observation taken on July 10 showed that the voyageurs had reached latitude 67? 47' north. From the extreme variation of the compass, and from other signs, Mackenzie was now certain that he was approaching the northern ocean. He was assured that in a few days more of travel he could reach its shores. But in the meantime his provisions were running low. His Indian guide, a prey to fantastic terrors, endeavoured to dissuade him from his purpose, while his canoe men, now far beyond the utmost limits of the country known to the fur trade, began to share the apprehensions of the guide, and clamoured eagerly for return. Mackenzie himself was of the opinion that it would not be possible for him to return to Chipewyan while the rivers were still open, and that the approach of winter must surprise him in these northern solitudes. But in spite of this he could not bring himself to turn back. With his men he stipulated for seven days; if the northern ocean were not found in that time he would turn south again.

The expedition went forward. On July 10, they made a course of thirty-two miles, the river sweeping with a strong current through a low, flat country, a mountain range still visible in the west and reaching out towards the north. At the spot where they pitched their tents at night on the river bank they could see the traces of an encampment of Eskimos. The sun shone brilliantly the whole night, never descending below the horizon. Mackenzie sat up all night observing its course in the sky. At a quarter to four in the morning, the canoes were off again, the river winding and turning in its course but heading for the north-west. Here and there on the banks they saw traces of the Eskimos, the marks of camp fires, and the remains of huts, made of drift-wood covered with grass and willows. This day the canoes travelled fifty-four miles. The prospect about the travellers was gloomy and dispiriting. The low banks of the river were now almost treeless, except that here and there grew stunted willow, not more than three feet in height. The weather was cloudy and raw, with gusts of rain at intervals. The discontent of Mackenzie's companions grew apace: the guide was evidently at the end of his knowledge; while the violent rain, the biting cold and the fear of an attack by hostile savages kept the voyageurs in a continual state of apprehension. July 12 was marked by continued cold, and the canoes traversed a country so bare and naked that scarcely a shrub could be seen. At one place the land rose in high banks above the river, and was bright with short grass and flowers, though all the lower shore was now thick with ice and snow, and even in the warmer spots the soil was only thawed to a depth of four inches. Here also were seen more Eskimo huts, with fragments of sledges, a square stone kettle, and other utensils lying about.

Mackenzie was now at the very delta of the great river, where it discharges its waters, broken into numerous and intricate channels, into the Arctic ocean. On Sunday, July 12, the party encamped on an island that rose to a considerable eminence among the flat and dreary waste of broken land and ice in which the travellers now found themselves. The channels of the river had here widened into great sheets of water, so shallow that for stretches of many miles, east and west, the depth never exceeded five feet. Mackenzie and 'English Chief,' his principal follower, ascended to the highest ground on the island, from which they were able to command a wide view in all directions. To the south of them lay the tortuous and complicated channels of the broad river which they had descended; east and north were islands in great number; but on the westward side the eye could discern the broad field of solid ice that marked the Arctic ocean.

For three days Mackenzie remained beside the Arctic ocean. Heavy gales blew in from the north-west, and in the open water to the westward whales were seen. Mackenzie and his men, in their exultation at this final proof of their whereabouts, were rash enough to start in pursuit in a canoe. Fortunately, a thick curtain of fog fell on the ocean and terminated the chase. In memory of the occurrence, Mackenzie called his island Whale Island. On the morning of July 14, 1789, Mackenzie, convinced that his search had succeeded, ordered a post to be erected on the island beside his tents, on which he carved the latitude as he had calculated it , his own name, the number of persons who were with him and the time that was spent there.

This day Mackenzie spent in camp, for a great gale, blowing with rain and bitter cold, made it hazardous to embark. But on the next morning the canoes were headed for the south, and the return journey was begun. It was time indeed. Only about five hundred pounds weight of supplies was now left in the canoes--enough, it was calculated, to suffice for about twelve days. As the return journey might well occupy as many weeks, the fate of the voyageurs must now depend on the chances of fishing and the chase.

As a matter of fact the ascent of the river, which Mackenzie conducted with signal success and almost without incident, occupied two months. The weather was favourable. The wild gales which had been faced in the Arctic delta were left behind, and, under mild skies and unending sunlight, and with wild fowl abundant about them, the canoes were urged steadily against the stream. The end of the month of July brought the explorers to the Great Bear river; from this point an abundance of berries on the banks of the stream--the huckleberry, the raspberry and the saskatoon--afforded a welcome addition to their supplies. As they reached the narrower parts of the river, where it flowed between high banks, the swift current made paddling useless and compelled the men to haul the canoes with the towing line. At other times steady strong winds from the north enabled them to rig their sails and skim without effort over the broad surface of the river. Mackenzie noted with interest the varied nature and the fine resources of the country of the upper river. At one place petroleum, having the appearance of yellow wax, was seen oozing from the rocks; at another place a vast seam of coal in the river bank was observed to be burning. On August 22 the canoes were driven over the last reaches of the Mackenzie with a west wind strong and cold behind them, and were carried out upon the broad bosom of the Great Slave Lake. The voyageurs were once more in known country. The navigation of the lake, now free from ice, was without difficulty, and the canoes drove at a furious rate over its waters. On August 24 three canoes were sighted sailing on the lake, and were presently found to contain Leroux and his party, who had been carrying on the fur trade in that district during Mackenzie's absence.

The rest of the journey offered no difficulty. There remained, indeed, some two hundred and sixty miles of paddle and portage to traverse the Slave river and reach Fort Chipewyan. But to the stout arms of Mackenzie's trained voyageurs this was only a summer diversion. On September 12, 1789, Alexander Mackenzie safely reached the fort. His voyage had occupied one hundred and two days. Its successful completion brought to the world its first knowledge of that vast waterway of the northern country, whose extensive resources in timber and coal, in mineral and animal wealth, still await development.

THE MEMORABLE EXPLOITS OF SIR JOHN FRANKLIN

The long struggle of the war had halted the progress of discoveries in the northern seas. But on the conclusion of peace the attention of the nation, and of naval men in particular, was turned again towards the north. The Admiralty naturally sought an opportunity of giving honourable service to their officers and men. Great numbers of them had been thrown out of employment. Some migrated to the colonies or even took service abroad. At the same time the writings of Captain Scoresby, a whaling captain of scientific knowledge who published an account of the Greenland seas, and the influence of such men as Sir John Barrow, the secretary of the Admiralty, did much to create a renewal of public interest in the north. It was now recognized that the North-West Passage offered no commercial attractions. But it was felt that it would not be for the honour of the nation that the splendid discoveries of Hearne, Cook and Mackenzie should remain uncompleted. To trace the Arctic water-way from the Atlantic to the Pacific became now a supreme object, not of commercial interest, but of geographical research and of national pride. To this was added the fact that the progress of physical and natural science was opening up new fields of investigation for the explorers of the north.

These were the days of rivalry, and even open war, between the two great fur companies, the Hudson's Bay and the North-West. The Admiralty had commended Franklin's expeditions to the companies, who were to be requisitioned for the necessary supplies. But the disorders of the fur trade, and the demoralization of the Indians, owing to the free distribution of ardent spirits by the rival companies, rendered it impossible for the party to obtain adequate supplies and stores. Undeterred by difficulties, Franklin set out from Fort Providence to make his way to the Arctic seas at the mouth of the Coppermine. The expedition reached the height of land between the Great Slave Lake and the Coppermine, on the borders of the country which had been the scene of Hearne's exploits. The northern forest is here reduced to a thin growth of stunted pine and willow. It was now the end of August. The brief northern summer was drawing to its close. It was impossible to undertake the navigation of the Arctic coast till the ensuing summer. Franklin and his party built some rude log shanties which they called Fort Enterprise. Here, after having traversed over two thousand miles in all from York Factory, they spent their second winter in the north. It was a season of great hardship. With the poor materials at their hand it was impossible to make their huts weatherproof. The wind whistled through the ill-plastered seams of the logs. So intense was the winter cold that the trees about the fort froze hard to their centres. In cutting firewood the axes splintered as against stone. In the officers' room the thermometer, sixteen feet from the log fire, marked as low as fifteen degrees below zero in the day and forty below at night. For food the party lived on deer's meat with a little fish, tea twice a day , and on Sunday a cup of chocolate as the luxury of the week to every man. But, undismayed by cold and hardship, they kept stoutly at their work. Richardson investigated the mosses and lichens beneath the snow and acquainted himself with the mineralogy of the neighbourhood. Franklin and the two lieutenants carried out observations, their fingers freezing with the cold of forty-six below zero at noon of the brief three-hour day in the heart of winter. Sunday was a day of rest. The officers dressed in their best attire. Franklin read the service of the Church of England to his assembled company. For the French-Canadian Roman Catholics, Franklin did the best he could; he read to them the creed of the Church of England in French. In the leisure part of the day a bundle of London newspapers was perused again and again.

The winter passed safely; the party now entered upon the most arduous part of their undertaking. Canoes were built and dragged on improvised sledges to the Coppermine. Franklin descended the river, surveying its course as he went. He passed by the scene of the massacre witnessed by Hearne, and found himself, late in July of 1821, on the shores of the Arctic. The distance from Fort Enterprise was three hundred and thirty-four miles, for one hundred and seventeen of which the canoes and baggage had been hauled over snow and ice.

They were now only forty miles from Fort Enterprise. But their strength was failing. Hood could not go on. The party divided. Franklin and Back went forward with most of the men, while Richardson and sailor Hepburn volunteered to stay with Hood till help could be sent. The others left them in a little tent, with some rounds of ammunition and willow branches gathered for the fire. A little further on the march, three of Franklin's followers, too exhausted to go on, dropped out, proposing to make their way back to Richardson and Hood.

The little party at the tent in the snow waited in vain. Days passed, and no help came. One of the three men who had left Franklin, an Indian called Michel, joined them, saying that the others had gone astray in the snow. But he was strange and sullen, sleeping apart and wandering off by himself to hunt. Presently, from the man's strange talk and from some meat which he brought back from his hunting and declared to be part of a wolf, Richardson realized the awful truth that Michel had killed his companions and was feeding on their bodies. A worse thing followed. Richardson and Hepburn, gathering wood a few days later, heard the report of a gun from beside the fire where they had left Lieutenant Hood, who was now in the last stage of exhaustion. They returned to find Michel beside the dead body of their comrade. He had been shot through the back of the head. Michel swore that Hood had killed himself. Richardson knew the truth, but both he and Hepburn were too enfeebled by privation to offer fight to the armed and powerful madman. The three set out for Fort Enterprise, Michel carrying a loaded gun, two pistols and a bayonet, muttering to himself and evidently meditating a new crime. Richardson, a man of iron nerve, forestalled him. Watching his opportunity, he put a pistol to the Indian's head and blew his brains out.

Richardson and Hepburn dragged themselves forward mile by mile, encouraged by the thought of the blazing fires and the abundant food that they expected to find at Fort Enterprise. They reached the fort just in the dusk of an October evening. All about it was silence. There were no tracks in the newly fallen snow. Only a thin thread of smoke from the chimney gave a sign of life. Hurriedly they made their way in. To their horror and dismay they found Franklin and three companions, two Canadians and an Indian, stretched out in the last stages of famine. 'No words can convey an idea,' wrote Dr Richardson later on, 'of the filth and wretchedness that met our eyes on looking around. Our own misery had stolen upon us by degrees and we were accustomed to the contemplation of each other's emaciated figures, but the ghastly countenances, dilated eye-balls, and sepulchral voices of Captain Franklin and those with him were more than we could bear.' Franklin, on his part, was equally dismayed at the appearance of Richardson and Hepburn. 'We were all shocked,' he says in his journal, 'at beholding the emaciated countenances of the doctor and Hepburn, as they strongly evidenced their extremely debilitated state. The alteration in our appearance was equally distressing to them, for since the swellings had subsided we were little more than skin and bone. The doctor particularly remarked the sepulchral tone of our voices, which he requested us to make more cheerful if possible, unconscious that his own partook of the same key.'

Such had been the position of things when Richardson and Hepburn, themselves almost in the last stage of exhaustion, found their unhappy comrades. Richardson was a man of striking energy, of the kind that knows no surrender. He set himself to gather wood, built up a blazing fire, dressed as well as he could the swollen body of the Indian, and tried to bring some order into the filth and squalor of the hut. Hepburn meantime had killed a partridge, which the doctor then divided among them in six parts, the first fresh meat that Franklin and those with him had tasted for thirty-one days. This done, 'the doctor,' so runs Franklin's story, 'brought out his prayer book and testament, and some prayers and psalms and portions of scripture appropriate to the situation were read.'

But beyond the consolation of manifesting a brave and devout spirit, there was little that Richardson could do for his companions. The second night after his arrival Peltier died. There was no strength left in the party to lift his body out into the snow. It lay beside them in the hut, and before another day passed Samandr?, the other Canadian, lay dead beside it. For a week the survivors remained in the hut, waiting for death. Then at last, and just in time, help reached them.

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