IN THE BARREN GROUNDS 209 



ian, the pluckiest in the country. That was why I made 

 such an effort to get him. 



We must have gone close to forty miles the first day, 

 and at noon of the second came to a big lake the Indians 

 called, as near as I can write it, Ecka-tiia (which means fat 

 water lake), and I was able for the first time since leav- 

 ing Beniah's lodge to about locate myself on the map. 

 Ecka-tua on the map, as I knew, is Point Lake, the source 

 of Coppermine River; and as I also knew it was 334 miles 

 from Fort Enterprise to the mouth of the Coppermine 

 by canoe, vid Ecka-tua, I was sure we could get very close 

 to the Arctic Ocean, travelling due north, at the rate we 

 had been going. I had no sextant, and relied for deter- 

 mination of location upon the deflection of my compass 

 needle (which at this point was 35 east of north), and 

 upon the number of miles we made each day. The num- 

 ber of degrees of deflection I read at night, when it did 

 not storm, by the north star, and the number of miles per 

 day is easily reckoned by every man who has had any 

 walking experience. Besides, I had a pedometer. 



Ecka-tua was full four miles wide at our point of cross- 

 ing. We had no meat to eat and no wood to spare for 

 mid-day tea, so we pushed on, running, which was rather 

 trying on fare limited to an occasional pipe and a mouth- 

 ful of very dry snow. We were keeping, of course, a 

 sharp lookout for caribou all this time, and, besides having 

 scouts out on either side, we halted on the top of every 

 ridge that was high enough to furnish a view, where I 

 scanned the country on all sides through my glasses, and 

 we all smoked another pipe and tried to suck some moist- 

 ure from the snow. There is a difference in eating- snow 



o 



and sucking the moisture from it ; neither is satisfactory, 

 but the former is harmful to the traveller, and pretty 



certain to be followed by increased thirst and cramps. 

 14 



