“Yes,” assented Rob, “I remember Mackenzie’s story, how very beautiful he found this country soon after he started west on his trip.”
“My people, the Crees, took this country from others long ago,” said Alex, rather proudly. “They came up the old war-trail from Little Slave Lake to the mouth of the Smoky, where the Peace River Landing is now. They fought the Beavers and the Stoneys clear to the edges of the Rockies, where we are now. They’ve held the land ever since, and managed to make a living on it, with or without the white man’s help. Some of us will change, but men like At-tick, the old Indian who brought Jess across the trail, and like old Picheu, below here, aren’t apt to change very much.”
John was once more puzzling at the map which the boys had made for themselves, following the old Mackenzie records. “I can’t figure out just where Mackenzie started from on his trip, but he says it was longitude 117° 35′ 15″, latitude 56° 09′. Now, that doesn’t check up with our map at all. That would make his start not very far from the fort, or what they call the Peace River Landing to-day, I should think. But he only mentions a ‘small stream coming from the east,’ although Moise says the Smoky is quite a river.”
“Most people think Mackenzie started from Fort Chippewayan,” said Alex, “but as a matter of fact, he wintered far southwest of there, on the Peace River, somewhere between three hundred and four hundred miles south and west of Fort Vermilion, as I gather from the length of time it took him to get to the edge of the Rockies, where we are now. He mentions the banks getting higher as he went south and west. When you get a couple of hundred miles north of the Landing the banks begin to get low, although at the Landing they’re still almost a thousand feet high above the water-level, at least eight hundred feet, I should say.”
“Well,” said Rob, “we know something about this country ourselves now, and we’ll make a map of it some time, perhaps—a better one than we have now.”
“Yes,” said Jesse, “but who can draw in that horse-trail from Hudson’s Hope to the head of the steamboat transport? I’d like to see that trail!”
“I suppose we could get on the steamboat some time before long if we wanted to,” said John.
“No,” said Alex, “hardly again this summer, for she’s made her last trip with supplies up to Fort St. John by now.”
“We don’t want any steamboat, nor anything else,” said Rob, “except to go on down on our own hook, the way we started. Let’s be as wild as we can!”