“It don’t do, Lawrence,” said he, “to go for to interfere wi’ them as leads. Be they wise or be they foolish it on’y makes matters wus to interfere wi’ leaders, my lad; therefore it’s best always to hold your tongue an’ do yer dooty. What Monsieur Mackenzie is, it ain’t for the likes of you and me to pretend for to judge. He seems to me an able, brave, and wise man, so my colours is nailed to the mast, d’ye see—as was said by the immortal Lord Nelson—an’ I’ve made up my mind to follow him to the end, through thick and thin. It’s little right I would have to claim to be a pioneer if I didn’t hold them sentiments.”
“Them sentiments,” we need scarcely add, were heartily echoed by his Indian friend and his son.
The appearance of deserted native encampments still further confirmed Mackenzie in his belief that he had at length reached the land of the Esquimaux. Round their fireplaces were found scattered pieces of whalebone, and spots were observed where train-oil had been spilt. The deserted huts also corresponded in construction with those which were known to be built elsewhere by the denizens of the far north. Several runners of sledges were also found, and the skulls of a large animal, which was conjectured to be the walrus. Here the land was covered with short grass and flowers, though the earth was not thawed above four inches from the surface; beneath that all was frozen hard.
The pioneers had now at last reached the entrance of what appeared to be a lake, which was in the neighbourhood of the Polar Sea, if not that sea itself; but the variety of channels, the strength of currents, the shallowness of the water and quantity of ice with which it was beset, with the ignorance of their guide, rendered it impossible to make any further advance that season. The object of the expedition, however, had been accomplished. The largest northern river of America, estimated at 2000 miles in length, had been traced from its source to its outlet in the Polar Sea; the nature of the country and its inhabitants had been ascertained; coal and copper ore had been discovered; the region had been wrenched from the realms of terra incognita, and the energetic pioneer fixed the position of his most northerly discoveries in 69 degrees 7 minutes north latitude. Another fact which proved that they were within the influence of the sea was the rise and fall of the water, which could be nothing else than the tide.
They caught a fish, also, resembling a herring, which none of the party had ever seen except English Chief who declared it to be of a kind that abounds in Hudson’s Bay, and finally they beheld what settled the question, a shoal of white whales, which their Indian guide said was the principal food of the Esquimaux.
It was no wonder that the discoverers found the navigation very intricate, because that great river, now named the Mackenzie, is known to empty its waters into the Polar Sea by innumerable mouths which form a delta of about forty miles in width. Storms, rain, and fogs, threw additional hindrances in their way. There was, therefore, nothing left for it but to erect a post and take possession of the land in the name of the King.
Homeward! after that, was the order of the day. But what a mighty distance off that home was! And, after all, when reached it was but a log-hut or two in a part of the vast wilderness which, regarded from a civilised-land point of view, was itself the very confines of the known world. Our space forbids us to follow Mackenzie and his men on their arduous and interesting return voyage. Suffice it to say that they dragged the canoes by means of lines against the strong current for a large portion of the way; and, after incurring innumerable dangers from natives, rapids, storms, and starvation, they reached the Lake of the Hills and landed at Fort Chipewyan on the 12th of September 1789, having been absent for the long period of one hundred and two days.
That our hero was not content to rest upon the laurels thus gathered in the far north, but longed to act the part of pioneer over the Rocky Mountains into the far west, shall be made plain in our next chapter.