DECLINE OF THE YELLOW KNIVES. 457 



annihilated the boasted ascendency of their ty- 

 rants, From this contest dates the downfall of the 

 Yellow Knives : their well-known chiefs, and the 

 flower of their youth — all who had strength or 

 ability were massacred ; and the wretched rem- 

 nant were driven from the rich hunting grounds 

 about theYellowKnife River to the comparatively 

 barren hills bordering on Great Slave Lake. This 

 revolution in their fortunes, followed as it was 

 by suspicion, fear, and discontent, has sensibly 

 affected the race itself, and entailed a degeneracy 

 from which they will probably never recover. 

 There cannot now be more than seventy families 

 remaining; and these comprise few able men, 

 the greater proportion being aged, infirm, and 

 decrepit, who are regarded as burthens upon 

 the more active and working portion of the com- 

 munity. To complete their calamities, they have 

 been visited by a contagious disease, which is 

 fatally prevalent: slowly, but surely, this is con- 

 signing them to death, and, without such as- 

 sistance as it. is feared cannot be rendered, must 

 eventually sweep them away from among the 

 tribes of the north. 



Their speculations regarding the creation, &c. 

 are dwelt on at length in Franklin's Journey 

 to the Polar Sea ; but most of them are either 

 forgotten, or strangely distorted by the present 

 generation, who content themselves with a sim- 



