202 Transactions of the Canadian Institute. [vol. ix 



A party travelling through, or stopping in, that country can add 

 largely to its supply of provisions by catching the fish which are so abun- 

 dant in the rivers and lakes, and by shooting the Caribou which roam in 

 vast herds over the open plains, but it is never safe to depend on these 

 sources of supply, for both may fail at critical times, or if they do not en- 

 tirely fail they may become so scanty as to tax the strength and energy of 

 the party in order to obtain sufificient food to support existence, while 

 that very strength and energy should be devoted to prospecting and ex- 

 ploration. It would therefore be advisable for any party entering the 

 country to take with it provisions sufificient to supply at least two-thirds 

 of the normal rations, chiefly in the form of cereals, sugar and fat, 

 while the region itself might be depended on to supply a fair quantity 

 of lean meat. 



The Coppermine River itself, which flows through the middle of 

 the Coppermine country, is a stream from four to five hundred miles 

 long. It rises somewhere to the east or northeast of Point Lake, (Indian 

 Ekka tua,) and flows from that lake northward to north latitude 67° 48' 

 where it empties into Coronation Gulf, one of the great bays of the Arctic 

 Ocean, five hundred miles east of the mouth of the Mackenzie River. 

 The stream is swift but rather shallow, and is broken by numerous 

 rapids, though most of these can be descended in canoes under the guid- 

 ance of good canoemen. The ice on it breaks up annually about the first 

 of June and does not form again until about the first of October. Its 

 Indian name is Tzan deze, meaning Metal River. 



The Coppermine country lies within what are known as the Barren 

 Grounds, or, to use the proper translation of the Indian name, the Tree- 

 less Region, where all the uplands are devoid of trees and almost devoid 

 of shrubs, and bear but a stunted growth of grasses, sedges, and low 

 Arctic annuals. Near the head of the river some trees, chiefly spruce, 

 tamarac and poplar, grow around the shores of Point Lake and groves 

 of smaller trees extend northward along its banks to within twenty miles 

 of its mouth. 



For more than two hundred years native copper has been known 

 to exist on the banks of the Coppermine River, and over large areas in 

 its vicinity. Writing about 1 7 14 M. Jeremie, who had been in charge 

 of York factory or Fort Bourbon, then the most northerly trading post 

 on the west side of Hudson Bay, between 1708 and 1714, while it was in 

 the hands of the French, says of the Dogribbed Indians: "They have in 

 their country a Mine of Red Copper so abundant and so pure that without 

 putting it through the forge, just as they obtain it at the Mine, they 

 pound it between two stones and make anything that they wish with it. 

 I have often seen it, since our Indians constantly bring it from there 

 when they go in war parties." 



