DOWN THE MACKENZIE j^c 



I camped the second night on a narrow ledge at the foot of 

 a bank, three hundred feet in height, opposite the site of the 

 original Fort Good Hope. 1 



On the third day, I was delayed by a head wind so that I 

 only traveled fifty miles though I continued until midnight. I 

 was then in the Land of the Midnight Sun which enabled me to 

 travel at any time. I soon became accustomed to the continu- 

 ous sunshine and came to prefer it to the usual alternation of 

 daylight and darkness. To save time, I ate my meals while 

 drifting and spent very little time ashore. 



I passed several camps of Loucheux Indians who were living 

 in canvas tents or low lodges of loose skins, pitched at the 

 mouths of tributary streams where the eddies supplied them 

 with fish. I avoided them as much as possible, not having the 

 tea and tobacco to satisfy their importunities, nor time to waste 

 in relieving their curiosity at sight of a solitary "Chi-sai-witc-m " 

 (white man). As soon as they saw that I was going past without 

 stopping they would dash pell-mell down the bank, and come 

 off in their canoes, following me for a mile or two to beg for 

 "lee tea." I expected to find a large band of Loucheux at the 

 mouth of the Red River, to avoid which I kept along the oppo- 

 site bank. I could see their lodges plainly, and was just con- 

 gratulating myself on having escaped them, when I reached 

 the sharp turn to the northwest below the Lower Ramparts 

 and suddenly found myself within a hundred yards of a dozen 

 lodges. All was in an uproar in a moment. Some rushed 

 toward the canoes, others began shouting and beckoning to 

 me to come ashore. I thought that the men with the skiff 

 must be close at hand and its occupants had more time to 

 waste than I, so I pointed up the river and imitated the motion 

 of rowing at which they left their canoes and several climbed 

 the high bank to watch for the boat. 



An eccentric little windmill, made of three pieces of spruce, 

 was wobbling at a rapid rate on a stake set up in a conspicuous 

 place on the bank. Unlike the superstitious natives about 



1 Between the date of Franklin's second voyage in 1826, and that of 

 Simpson, in 1836, the post was moved to Manitou Island, opposite its pres- 

 ent site. The island was flooded with " two fathoms " of water during the 

 June rise of 1836, which mowed down the forest and injured, but did not 

 carry away, the buildings. The inhabitants escaped in a boat to a lake in 

 the center of the island. Simpson, Thomas, "Narrative," p. 99. 



