Copyright Ernest Brown
THE RAMPARTS, MACKENZIE RIVER
A Sad Case
Some time in April before leaving home I received a letter from an old friend named Slean. It had been written on Christmas Day from Arctic Red River Post, some 300 miles beyond Fort Good Hope. The writer, who had gone north the previous summer from Edmonton was engaged with an independent fur trading company, and being a young man of good education was desirous of having some diversion from the everlasting talk of “Furs and Supplies,” to beguile his lonely life and requested me to endeavour to get the Government to establish a Meteorological Office there, and to say that if they would send him a few instruments and the necessary forms he would be glad to report as frequently as possible, adding a most unusual proposition for an applicant for a government position that he would not expect any salary. This request I forwarded on to my friend Mr. Stupart, Director of the Meteorological Observatory, and on my way down I had the satisfaction of seeing these requisites en route.
I did not reply to the letter inasmuch as I was going by the first transport and would reach his post in person at the same time as a letter would, and I looked forward with a good deal of pleasure to surprising him in his distant home.
Just as we were entering Great Slave Lake, a week before reaching Good Hope, we passed the scows owned by Slean’s Company, also going North as far as Fort Good Hope, which point we would reach some time before they would. I was informed by the man in charge that Slean would probably come up to Good Hope to get the scow containing his supplies which they pointed out to me as “No. 11,” and that he would likely be there on our arrival.
Our steamer had been expected at Fort Good Hope for several days and her arrival was anxiously looked for, so that when she did appear at a convenient hour all the village was on the bank to greet us. I looked anxiously among the dusky faces to see the fair complexion of my friend but he was not present, so I inquired for the buildings of his Company. A few whitewashed houses were pointed out a little down the river to which I at once repaired, and on inquiry from a white man whom I met was informed that my friend was in one of the houses, but that he was very ill. On entering I was told that he had reached Good Hope two weeks previously from his own post after a ten days’ journey up stream, but in such a weak condition that he had to be helped up the bank from his canoe. Since that time he had continued to get worse and that there was no hope of his recovery. I was informed that he was sleeping in an adjoining room. A few moments later he awoke and I entered the room. It had little the appearance of a sick room except that of the occupant. We are so accustomed to associate with the sick chamber clean linen, comfortable bedding, with all the little delicacies of nourishment and soothing cordials, that the contrast in this case was disheartening. Not that his two white friends were not less attentive than a trained nurse would have been. On the contrary they were doing all that mortals could under the circumstances. One of these men was a Mr. Darrell, who had accompanied Hanbury, on his trip around the shore of the Arctic Sea a year or two before, and whose excellent qualities are mentioned in Hanbury’s narrative of that expedition, and I know he refused a good offer for the season rather than leave the sick man. The other young man, Slater, who was also with him I have no reason to think was less attentive, but it was impossible to obtain, especially before the arrival of the supplies which our boat brought, food that would tempt the palate of a white man even in good health. He recognised me at once and commenced his conversation by informing me in broken accents that he had taken a little cold on his way up the river but that he was all right and would get up the next morning, take a good cold bath and be around again; but I saw at once that he was in a delirious condition and that in all human probability his wanderings would soon be over. I spent an hour with him which I repeated before our steamer left at midnight. His death came even sooner than I expected, for I afterwards learned that he passed away the next day, and when our steamer called on her return trip shortly after, the passengers visited a lonely grave in the Catholic Cemetery in which lay the remains of William John Slean. This was another reminder that the bright Arctic summer days sometimes have their dark shadows.
It was a little after midnight of July 20, when we left Good Hope and on rising next morning I found we had passed the Arctic Circle. The river is now widening, the banks are getting lower and the timber is growing smaller, all these indicate that we are fast drifting down towards the Arctic Sea. Some time in the evening we stopped at Arctic Red River at the entrance of a stream of the same name. It certainly was the least desirable place for any civilised man to choose for a home, that I had yet seen in all this Northland. A few houses, the church and the graveyard were all crowded on the side of a hill rising abruptly from the river. Perpetual frost was found only a foot beneath the surface of the soil, and we no longer beheld the emblems of civilised life, the vegetable and flower gardens, that go so far to make many of those lonely posts seem somewhat cheerful.
I wandered up to the log shack which poor Slean had occupied during the previous winter and which he had left only a few weeks before. A more dreary habitation it would be difficult to imagine. I looked around the room to see if there was any memento that I might carry home to his friends, but the only thing I could see was a little green flag pinned to the wall, a touching tribute of patriotic devotion to the far away island which had given him birth. It seemed like desecration to remove it, so I allowed it to remain where he had placed it.