NORTHERN OCEAN. 135 
This was the firft time we had feen any of the ,74,, 
mufk-oxen fince we left the Factory. It has been a 
obferved that we faw a great number of them in 
my firft unfuccefsful attempt, before I had got an 
hundred miles from the Factory ; and indeed I 
once perceived the tracks of two of thofe animals 
within nine miles of Prince of Wales’s Fort. 
Great numbers of them alfo were met with in my 
fecond journey to the North: feveral of which 
my companions killed, particularly on the feven- 
teenth of July one thoufand feven hundred and 
feventy. They are alfo found at times in confi- 
derable numbers near the fea-coaft of Hudfon’s 
Bay, allthe way from Knapp’s Bay to Wager 
Water, but are moft plentiful within the Arctic 
Circle. In thofe high latitudes I have frequently 
feen many herds of them in the courfe of a day’s 
walk, and fome of thofe herds did not contain 
lefs than eighty or an hundred head. The num- 
ber of bulls is very few in proportion to the 
cows; for it is rare to fee more than two or three 
full-grown bulls with the largeft herd: and from 
the number of the males that are found dead, the 
Indians are of opinion that they kill each other 
in contending for the females. In the rutting 
feafon they are fo jealous of the cows, that they 
run at cither man or beaft who offers to approach 
them ; and have been obferved to run and bellow 
even at ravens, and other large birds, which 
chanced to light near them. ‘lhey delight in the 
moft ftony and mountainous parts of the barren 
ground, 
