INTRODUCTION 55 



of Wager Strait ; * for it is represented by the last discoverers 

 to terminate in small rivers and lakes. See how far the woods 

 are from the navigable parts of it ; and whether a settlement 

 could with any propriety be made there. If this should prove 

 unworthy of notice, you are to take the same method with 

 Baker's Lake, which is the head of [xl] Bowden's or Chester- 

 field's Inlet ; t as also with any other rivers you may meet with ; 

 and if likely to be of any utility, you are to take possession of 

 them, as before mentioned, on the behalf of the Honourable 

 Hudson's Bay Company. The draft of Bowden's Inlet and 

 Wager Strait I send with you, that you may have a better idea 

 of those places, in case of your visiting them, 



" 4thly, Another material point which is recommended 

 to you, is to find out, if you can, either by your own travels, 

 or by information from the Indians, whether there is a passage 

 through this continent. + It will be [xli] very useful to clear up 



* There is certainly no harm in making out all Instructions in the fullest 

 manner, yet it must be allowed that those two parts might have been omitted 

 with great propriety ; for as neither Middleton, Ellis, nor Christopher were 

 able to penetrate far enough up those inlets to discover any kind of herbage 

 except moss and grass, much less woods, it was not likely those parts were so 

 materially altered for the better since their times, as to make it worth my while 

 to attempt a farther discovery of them ; and especially as I had an opportunity, 

 during my second Journey, of proving that the woods do not reach the sea- 

 coast by some hundreds of miles in the parallel of Chesterfield's Inlet. And as 

 the edge of the woods to the Northward always tends to the Westward, the 

 distance must be greatly increased in the latitude of Wager Strait. Those 

 parts have long since been visited by the Company's servants, and are within 

 the known limits of their Charter ; consequently require no other form of 

 possession. 



t See the preceding Note. 



X The Continent of America is much wider than many people imagine, 

 particularly Robson, who thought that the Pacific Ocean was but a few days 

 journey from the West coast of Hudson's Bay. This, however, is so far from 

 being the case, that when I was at my greatest Western distance, upward of 

 five hundred miles from Prince of Wales's Fort, the natives, my guides, well 

 knew that many tribes of Indians lay to the West of us, and they knew no end 

 to the land in that direction ; nor have I met with any Indians, either Northern 

 or Southern, that ever had seen the sea to the Westward. It is, indeed, well 

 known to the intelligent and well-informed part of the Company's servants, 

 that an extensive and numerous tribe of Indians, called E-arch-e-thinnews> 



