[TYRRELL] PETER FIDLER, TRADER AND SURVEYOR 125 



destined to spend the winter at Beaver River. On the 12th, while 

 passing through Pelican Lake, " David Thompson, in a small canoe, 

 two Indian boys, and one Canadian passed us just before we put up. 

 We did not speak together. He is going to Cumberland House. " 

 Why these two men, who had so many ideals in common, would now 

 pass each other in the wilderness without speaking is not known. 

 With a man of Thompson's kindly disposition there must have been 

 some strong reason for his estrangement from Fidler. 



The following is David Thompson's reference to this meeting, 

 "August 12th, Sunday .... At 7^ P M. we met 4 H.B. canoes, each 

 4 men, with two clerks. They [have] a woman also per canoe. 2 of 

 them for Isle a la Crosse and 2 for Athabasca as we suppose. Old La 

 Rivière was following them, gave him two pieces of dried meat." 



On the 24th of August he arrived at Isle a la Crosse House, wheie 

 he learnt that the Green Lake House had been burned down by John 

 Tapert. On the 26th, leaving Mr. Sutherland with two canoes to go 

 up to Green Lake, he started for Lake Athabasca, where he arrived 

 on the 11th of September, and where he says, "The French have des- 

 troyed our garden, stolen our canoes, made a house to watch us, and 

 put up two tents close to our house, not four yards from it, to keep 

 every Indian away. Got here this summer 80 MB and traded the 

 dry meat of eight moose, but at a very heavy expense. " 



Here his journal ends and we are thrown back on the meteorolo- 

 gical record and on some chance references in letters for information, 

 but it is clear that the winter was an unfortunate one, and so, early 

 in June of the following year (1806), Fidler abandoned Nottingham 

 House and the whole Athabasca country to his oponents and left for 

 his old home at Cumberland, a beaten, but not altogether a disheartened 

 trader. 



The following winter was spent at Cumberland House, with Daniel 

 Harman, of the North- West Company, in charge of the adjoining 

 trading post for that Company. The winter seems to have been a 

 pleasant and enjoyable one and the two traders spent many an evening 

 together over a game of cards or in some other light amusement, and 

 when provisions at any time failed the one seemed to supply the other 

 in a liberal and open-handed way. 



With the spring of 1807 our meteorological register, which has been 

 guiding us infallibly from place to place as Fidler travelled from one 

 trading post to another, comes to an end, but one of his journals con- 

 tinues two months beyond the date of this register. In it we find, 

 opposite the First of June, the following note: — "Got everything ready 

 to embark to the Athabasca to morrow," and under the 2nd, "Got 



Sec. II, 1913—8 



