i 7 8 THE WILDERNESS OF THE UPPER YUKON 



John Taylor, of the North-west Mounted Police, whom 

 Major Wood had detailed to make the Pelly River in- 

 spection. Besides the regular captain, pilot, and crew of 

 the Vidette, several trappers and prospectors, who had 

 come down the Pelly early in the summer to get pro- 

 visions, were there waiting for the boat to start, and 

 thoroughly happy at the generosity of Major Wood, who 

 had asked them to join the boat as guests of the govern- 

 ment, thus saving the long, hard journey which they 

 would have had if they had been obliged to pole and 

 track their loaded canoes up the river. 



Tom Jeffries, a tall, broad-shouldered French Cana- 

 dian, whom I had engaged to accompany me for the 

 summer, was there waiting for me. He had passed his 

 early life among the lumber camps in Eastern Canada, 

 and following his vocation had gradually drifted west- 

 ward until the Klondike rush, when he joined that ex- 

 cited crowd of gold-seekers. He, like so many others, 

 had wandered about the Yukon Territory in the hope of 

 locating a good prospect, until, after repeated failures, 

 he had taken to trapping for the purpose of getting a 

 grub-stake in order to again indulge the never-fading 

 hope of finding gold. Though not a hunter, he was a 

 thorough woodsman and was reputed to rank among 

 the best canoemen in the whole country. Also, he had 

 spent one winter on the banks of the Pelly opposite the 

 Glenlyon Mountains, where, later in the fall, I intended 

 to look for sheep. I had obtained a fine Strickland canoe 

 from the White Pass Railroad, and had purchased the old 

 horse D anger , one of our pack-horses of the preceding 



