306 THE NORTH-WEST PASSAGE BY LAND. 



husband's place ahead with an axe, and worked away 

 like a man. The last of the dried horse-flesh, boiled 

 with the scrapings of the flour-bag, formed our supper. 

 We had only three charges of powder left, and this we 

 kept for special emergency. The Assiniboine, however, 

 and his son had succeeded in *' nobbling " a brace of 

 partridges, knocking the young birds out of the trees 

 with short sticks, missiles they used with great 

 dexterity. We had been cheered during the day by 

 observing the first traces of man — except the dead body 

 of the Indian — we had seen for sixteen days. These 

 were old stumps of trees, which bore marks of an axe, 

 though now decayed and mossed over. The next day, 

 however, was cold and wet, and we felt wretched 

 enough as we forced our way for hours through a 

 beaver swamp, where the bracken grew higher than 

 our heads, and tangled willows of great size required 

 cutting away at every step. Slimy, stagnant pools, 

 treacherous and deep, continually forced us to turn 

 aside. At last a stream, whose banks were densely 

 clothed with underwood, barred the path, and we 

 could not find a practicable ford. Drenched to the 

 skin, shivering, miserable, having had no food since 

 the previous evening, we felt almost inclined to give 

 way to despair, for we seemed to have gained nothing 

 by our labours. There was no sign of the end. 



Our journey had now lasted nearly three months ; 

 for five weeks we had not seen a human being, nor for 

 the last three had we seen the smallest evidence of 

 man's presence at any time in the wild forest in 

 which we were buried. 



