326 THE NORTH-WEST PASSAGE BY LAND. 



unfortunate people drowned. Those who followed 

 were warned in time by the fate of their companions, 

 and succeeded in reaching the shore in safety. They 

 had now to cut their way along the precipitous banks 

 which proved so difl&cult to us, but as they landed 

 on the opposite side of the river, we did not come 

 across their trail. After reaching the end of the 

 Grand Rapid (Murchison's Rapids) they again made 

 rafts, and, shooting the lower rapids safely, arrived 

 in wretched plight at Kamloops. 



The third party, consisting of five Canadians — 

 three brothers named Rennie, and two others, Hel- 

 stone and Wright — crossed later in the autumn, and 

 obtained canoes at the Cache to descend the Eraser. 

 The Shushwaps there had informed us that they 

 had discovered the canoes lying bottom upwards, 

 and their property strewn along the shore, below 

 some rapids, and believed that the whole party had 

 been drowned. But three of their number met with 

 a far more horrible fate than this. We now learnt 

 that, in order to shoot the dangerous rapids with 

 greater safety, they had lashed the two canoes 

 together ; but in spite of this precaution the boats 

 were swamped. Two of the Rennies succeeded in 

 reaching the shore, and the other three men a rock 

 in the middle of the stream. For two days and 

 nights the latter remained exposed to the bitter cold 

 of the commencing winter, without a morsel of food, 

 before their companions were able to effect their re- 

 lease. A rope was at last passed to the rock, and 

 the men hauled ashore, half dead with hunger, and 



