By Canadian Streams Part 3

"Antoine Payet, guide and second in command, leads the van, with a cart drawn by two horses and loaded with his private baggage, ca.s.settes, bags, kettles, etc. Madame Payet follows the cart with a child a year old on her back, very merry. Charles Bottineau, with two horses and a cart loaded with one and a half packs, his own baggage, and two young children, with kettles and other trash hanging on to it. Madame Bottineau, with a squalling infant on her back, scolding and tossing it about. Joseph Dubord goes on foot, with his long pipe-stem and calumet in his hand; Madame Dubord follows on foot, carrying his tobacco-pouch with a broad bead-tail. Antoine La Pointe, with another cart and horses, loaded with two pieces of goods and with baggage belonging to Brisebois, Jasmin and Pouliot, and a kettle hung on each side. Auguste Brisebois follows with only his gun on his shoulder and a fresh-lighted pipe in his mouth. Michel Jasmin goes next, like Brisebois, with gun and pipe, puffing out clouds of smoke. Nicolas Pouliot, the greatest smoker in the North-West, has nothing but pipe and pouch. These three fellows, having taken a farewell dram and lighted fresh pipes, go on brisk and merry, playing numerous pranks. Domin Livernois, with a young mare, the property of Mr. Langlois, loaded with weeds for smoking, an old worsted bag (madame's property), some squashes and potatoes, a small keg of fresh water, and two young whelps howling. Next goes Livernois'

young horse, drawing a _travaille_ loaded with his baggage and a large worsted _mashguemcate_ belonging to Madame Langlois. Next appears Madame Cameron's mare, kicking, rearing, and snorting, hauling a _travaille_ loaded with a bag of flour, cabbages, turnips, onions, a small keg of water, and a large kettle of broth. Michel Langlois, who is master of the band, now comes on leading a horse that draws a _travaille_ nicely covered with a new-painted tent, under which his daughter and Mrs. Cameron lie at full length, very sick; this covering or canopy has a pretty effect in the caravan, and appears at a great distance in the plains. Madame Langlois brings up the rear of the human beings, following the _travaille_ with a slow step and melancholy air, attending to the wants of her daughter, who, notwithstanding her sickness, can find no other expressions of grat.i.tude to her parents than by calling them dogs, fools, beasts, etc. The rear guard consists of a long train of twenty dogs--some for sleighs, some for game, and others of no use whatever, except to snarl and destroy meat. The total forms a procession nearly a mile long, and appears like a large band of a.s.siniboines."

To the uninitiated, it may be explained that a _ca.s.sette_ is a box for carrying small articles; calumet is, of course, the Indian pipe; a _travaille_ is a primitive species of conveyance, consisting of a couple of long poles, one end fastened to a horse or dog, as the case may be, and the other trailing on the ground. Cross-bars lashed midway hold the poles together, and serve as a foundation for whatever load, human or otherwise, it is intended to carry. _Mashguemcate_ is a species of bag, a general receptacle for odds and ends.

VIII

THE MIGHTY MACKENZIE

I love thee, O thou great, wild, rugged land Of fenceless field and snowy mountain height, Uprearing crests all starry-diademed Above the silver clouds.

LAUT.

There was a man in the western fur-trade who felt that other things were better worth while than the bartering of blankets and beads for beaver-skins. His heart responded to the compelling cry of the unknown, and one bright June day, in the year 1789, he set forth in quest of other worlds. The man was Alexander Mackenzie, and the worlds he sought to conquer were those of the far north. There was said to be a mighty river whose waters no white man had ever yet seen, whose source and outlet could only be guessed at, from the vague reports of Indians, whose banks were said to be infested with bloodthirsty tribes, and whose course was broken by so many and dangerous cataracts that no traveller might hope to navigate its waters and live.

Mackenzie, chafing at the dreary monotony of the fur-trader's life, listened eagerly to all such tales. He knew enough of Indian character to make due allowances for exaggerations; but had all that he heard been true, the prospect of danger would only have whetted his appet.i.te for exploration. From his post, Fort Chipewyan, on Lake Athabasca, the way lay clear, and he launched his canoe, manned by four Canadian _voyageurs_, while his Indian interpreters and hunters followed in a second. To Great Slave Lake they were on familiar waters, but beyond all was conjecture.

To appreciate the magnitude of Mackenzie's undertaking, one must bear in mind that his object was to trace the mighty river that afterward bore his name to its mouth. He had no certain knowledge where it might empty--perhaps into the Arctic, possibly into the Pacific. In any case it involved a long journey, with all sorts of possible difficulties, human and natural; and as he must travel light, with only a limited supply of provisions, it was essential that he should go and return in one season--the very short season of these far northern lat.i.tudes. The natives whom he questioned ridiculed the idea of descending the Mackenzie to its outlet and returning the same season. They a.s.sured him that it would take him the entire season to go down; that winter would overtake him before he could begin the return journey; and that he would certainly perish of cold or starvation, even if he escaped the hostile tribes of the lower waters of the river.

Mackenzie was confident that the journey could be made in the season, but to succeed they must travel at top speed. He had picked men with him, and it was fortunate that he had, for the pace was almost killing.

Half-past three in the morning generally saw them in the canoes and off for a long day's hard paddling. One day they paddled steadily from half-past two in the morning until six in the evening, except short stops for meals, covering seventy-two miles in spite of a head wind.

When they reached Great Slave Lake, they found it almost entirely covered with ice, though it was now the ninth of June. Coming down Slave River they had been tortured with mosquitoes and gnats, and the trees along the banks were in full leaf. This violent change was characteristic of the north. Five precious days were lost waiting for the ice to move, so that they might cross the lake. At last a westerly wind opened a pa.s.sage, and after some perilous adventures they made the northern sh.o.r.e. Coasting slowly to the westward, about the end of the month they rounded the point of a long island, and Mackenzie found himself on the great river. The current increased as they travelled down stream, and it was possible to make good progress.

On they went, day after day. July 1st they pa.s.sed the mouth of what the Indians called the River of the Mountain, afterward known as the Liard, where Fort Simpson was built many years later. As they proceeded, it became clear to Mackenzie that the river down which he was paddling must empty into the Arctic--but would it be possible to reach the ocean and return to Fort Chipewyan that season? The men were beginning to get discouraged, and it required all Mackenzie's enthusiasm and strength of purpose to keep them to the strenuous task. The tribes they met as they went north--Slaves and Dog-ribs and Hare Indians--did not prove as ferocious as they had been represented, but they one and all described the dangers of the river below as stupendous. The _voyageurs_ grumbled, but did not openly rebel. As for the Indians of Mackenzie's party, they were in open terror; expected at every turn of the river to come upon some of the fearful monsters of which the Slaves or Dog-ribs had warned them, and were only kept from deserting by Mackenzie's overmastering will. As they approached the mouth of the river, another terror was added--fear of meeting the Eskimos, for Indian and Eskimo were at deadly enmity. Altogether, the plucky explorer had troubles enough.

On the second of July he came within sight of the Rocky Mountains, whose glistening summits the Indians called _Manetoe aseniah_, or spirit-stones, and the following day he camped at the foot of a remarkable hill, constantly referred to in the narratives of Sir John Franklin, Richardson, and other later explorers, as the "Rock by the River Side." There is an admirable drawing of the rock, by Kendall, in the narrative of Franklin's second voyage.

A few days later Mackenzie pa.s.sed the mouth of Bear River, draining that huge reservoir, Great Bear Lake, whose discovery remained for later explorers to accomplish, and about one hundred and twenty-five miles below he came to the Sans Sault Rapids--the fearful waterfall against which the natives had warned him. As a matter of fact it can be safely navigated at almost any season of the year.

Another thirty miles brought the explorer to the afterward famous Ramparts of the Mackenzie. Here the banks suddenly contract to a width of five hundred yards, and for several miles the travellers pa.s.sed through a gigantic tunnel, whose walls of limestone rose majestically on either side to a height of from one hundred and twenty-five to two hundred and fifty feet.

At last they reached the delta of the river, and it was well that they were so near their destination, for the Indians were thoroughly demoralised and the _voyageurs_ dispirited, provisions were running perilously low, and the short northern summer was rapidly drawing to its close. On July 12th the party emerged from the river into what seemed to Mackenzie to be a lake, but which was really the mouth of the river.

The following day confirmation of this came with the rising tide, which very nearly carried off the men's baggage while they slept. Paddling over to an island, which he named Whale Island, to commemorate an exciting chase after a school of these enormous animals the previous day, Mackenzie erected a post, on which he engraved the lat.i.tude of the spot, his own name, the number of persons he had with him in the expedition, and the time spent on the island.

After a fruitless attempt to get in touch with the Eskimo, Mackenzie turned his face to the south, and, after a comparatively uneventful journey, arrived at Fort Chipewyan on September 12th, after a voyage of one hundred and two days. He had explored one of the greatest rivers of America, from Great Slave Lake to the Arctic, and he had added to the known world a territory greater than Europe. Nor was this all, for Mackenzie's journey to the Arctic was but the introduction to his even more difficult, and more momentous, expedition of three years later, over the mountains to the sh.o.r.es of the Pacific. This, however, does not lie within the compa.s.s of the present sketch.

BOYLE, SON AND WATCHURST PRINTERS, 3-5 WARWICK SQUARE, E.C.