The Northwest Passage 207 



mine River, and, in the night, barbarously mass 

 acred the whole body of men, women, and child 

 ren, and spoiled their tents. The site of the 

 massacre became known afterwards as the 

 Bloody Falls. 



&quot;It is remarkable that there is a bird in those 

 parts which the Indians there call the alarm 

 bird, or bird of warning, a sort of owl, which 

 hovers over the heads of strangers, and precedes 

 them in the direction they go. If these birds 

 see other moving objects they flit alternately 

 from one party to the other with a screaming 

 noise, so that the Indians place great confidence 

 in the alarm bird, to apprise them of the approach 

 of strangers, or to conduct them to herds of deer 

 or musk oxen. Mr. Hearne remarks that all the 

 time the Indians lay in ambush, preparatory to 

 the above-mentioned horrid massacre, a large 

 flock of these birds were continually flying about 

 and hovering alternately over the Indian and the 

 Esquimaux tents, making a noise sufficient to 

 wake any man out of the soundest sleep. The 

 Esquimaux, unhappily, have a great objection to 

 be disturbed from sleep, and will not be awakened 

 an obstinacy which seems to have cost that 

 band their lives.&quot; 



The Napoleonic Wars, and the American War 

 of Independence, turned, for the next half century, 

 the minds of men in other directions. No sooner 

 were these struggles over than the old magnet ROSS and 

 reasserted its power. The expeditions of Ross 

 and Parry in the Isabella and Alexander ; of Parry 



