TRAVELLING OVER ICE OR SNOW. 57 



Were, however, the opinion ever so general, that 

 the journey could not be accomplished, I should 

 still conceive, that one established fact of a journey 

 having been performed in a similar region on si- 

 milar ice, and under similar disadvantages, would 

 be a sufficient answer. But several accounts can 

 be brought forward to establish the fact of similar 

 journeys, and some of them equally difficult, ha- 

 ving been accomplished. I shall mention a few 

 instances. 



Ellis informs us, in his " Voyage to Hudson's 

 Bay*," that the North American Indians, who trade 

 with the factories of the Hudson's Bay Company, 

 frequently " travel 200 or 300 miles in the depth 

 of winter, through a wide open country, without 

 meeting with any house to receive them, or cany- 

 ing any tent to protect them." And that on such 

 journeys, when benighted on any open plain, they 

 are forced to lie down without fire, under shelter 

 only of the snow. He also mentions, that a man 

 can conveniently draw a load of above an hundi-cd 

 weight upon a sledge, a distance of fifteen or sixteen 

 miles, in a winter's day f . 



More recent travellers and voyagers inform xis, 

 that the Indians frequently perform much longer 

 journeys in winter ; and it is an established fact, that 

 many persons in the service of the Hudson's Bay 



* Page 195. t Id. p. 163. 



