50 F 'S HISTORY. 



company, which had contracted to take him to the mines for 

 that sum being one of the men whom we had heard of in 

 St. Paul's when the company broke up. Having a little money 

 still left, he bought an ox and a cart, and travelled alone to 

 Fort Garry, and worked there to make some money to buy a 

 fresh outfit, and with this he started for British Columbia a 

 journey of twelve hundred miles ; but on reaching Carlton his 

 ox died, and when I found him he was living in a miserable 

 lodge with some old Indians, who were given scraps from the 

 fort, which he shared with them, as it was against the policy 

 of the Company to help any white man coming into their terri- 

 tories, wishing to discourage immigration, as it interfered with 

 their monopoly. 



He was so miserable when I found him that I think he would 

 have died that winter, not being used to cold or able to eat 

 much of the food, which was only such as the sleigh-dogs got. 

 I found him to be a very pleasant and amusing man, who had 

 seen a great deal of life of most kinds, and we soon became 

 friends ; so when I was about to leave the Post I proposed that 

 he should come and pass the winter with me, an offer which he 

 accepted. 



The journey back to my cabin was a dreadful trial for him, 

 as he would not use snow-shoes, so that the track we made 

 would not bear him and he had to struggle along in two feet of 

 snow. Where the going was fairly good he could ride on the 

 sleigh, but then he immediately froze, so that several times we 

 had to stop and light a fire to warm him. 



We were three days doing the ninety miles, and I think 

 that Badger and I were quite as thankful to see the house as 

 he was, though the roughness of it struck him at once, and 



