226 MEET ESQUIMA UX. Chap. XIV. 



CHAPTER XIV. 



Meet Esquimaux — News of Franklin's people — Frighten a solitary 

 party — Reach the Great Fish River — On Montreal Island — Total 

 absence of all relics — Dog-driving — Examine Ogle Peninsula — 

 Discover a skeleton — Vagueness of Esquimaux information — Cape 

 Herschel — Cairn. 



*ith May* — To avoid snow-blindness, we commenced night- 

 marching. Crossing over from Matty Island towards the 

 shore of King William's Island, we continued our march 

 southward until midnight, when we had the good fortune 

 to arrive at an inhabited snow village. We found here ten 

 or twelve huts and thirty or forty natives of King William's 

 Island ; I do not think any of them had ever seen white 

 people alive before, but they evidently regarded us as 

 friends. We halted at a little distance, and pitched our 

 tent, the better to secure small articles from being stolen 

 whilst we bartered with them. 



I purchased from them six pieces of silver plate, bearing 

 the crests or initials of Franklin, Crozier, Fairholme, and 

 McDonald ; they also sold us bows and arrows of English 

 woods, uniform and other buttons, and offered us a heavy 

 sledge made of two short stout pieces of curved wood, 

 which no mere boat could have furnished them with, but 

 this of course we could not take away; the silver spoons 

 and forks were readily sold for four needles each. 



They were most obliging and peaceably disposed, but 

 could not resist the temptation f o steal, and were impor- 



