286 ANOTHER CACHE. 



The cache was most welcome, as, but for this 

 seasonable supply, we must have opened the 

 pemmican that night. It consisted of deer and 

 musk oxen, both very poor, and the latter 

 strongly impregnated with the odour to which it 

 owes its name. This was so disagreeable to 

 some of the party, that they declared they would 

 rather starve three days than swallow a mouth- 

 ful ; which coming to my knowledge, though 

 not spoken within my hearing, I thought it 

 right to counteract the feeling, and accord- 

 ingly ordered the daily rations to be served from 

 it for our own mess as well as theirs, and took 

 occasion to impress on their minds the injurious 

 consequences of voluntary abstinence, and the 

 necessity of accommodating their tastes to such 

 food as the country might supply. 



The similarity of the extensive openings right 

 andleft'made me again hesitate where to direct my 

 steps ; but, aware of the deception arising from 

 overlapping points, I ultimately persevered in my 

 first idea, though against the opinion of my party, 

 who thought we were going into a bay ; nor, in- 

 deed, was I by any means certain, until some rotten 

 ice, and a lane of open water following, indicated 

 the narrow of which we were in search. All doubt 

 on this score was soon removed by a long line of 

 marks leading to another cache, which, with the 

 former one, made a total of eleven animals to- 



