108 THE BARREN-GROUND CARIBOU 



hood of Lac du Brochet (north end Reindeer 

 Lake). Fall migration witnessed in October, 

 November, or December. Spring migration in 

 April, May. Caribou seen each year from 1874 

 till 1884 : none seen from 1885 until the autumn 

 of 1889." 



Those notes contained for me one main idea — 

 that Lac du Brochet was a particular winter 

 haunt of the Caribou. That thought caught hold 

 and took root. 



Hence you have found me entering the Land of 

 the Caribou — hence was I in the middle of 

 August 1914 (beyond the reach of knowing of 

 war, which I did not learn had broken out until 

 October) approaching the height of land that 

 occurs in latitude 59° and longitude 102°, 800 

 miles, by the course I had travelled, from my 

 starting-point east of Prince Albert. 



Passing Fort du Brochet, before entering the 

 Cochrane River, I had been told by Philip 

 Merasty — an ancient Hudson Bay servant and 

 crafty hunter, and a fine old halfbreed who, but 

 for his name and elementary mission education, 

 you would take for a full-blooded Indian — that 

 during the past three years the Caribou had been 

 arriving in their neighbourhood at an earlier 

 date than formerly. It was in October and 

 November that Caribou appeared in former 

 years, he said, but they looked for them now in 

 late August and September. Yet in his crude 

 diary, which I found secreted in his cabin eaves 

 some weeks later, I came on the illuminating 

 information that his son Pierre had seen the first 

 Caribou on frozen Reindeer Lake on October 21, 



