170 A JOURNEY TO THE 



1771- possible, and acquaint any Indians they might meet, of our 

 'approach. By those Indians I also sent some small presents, 

 as the surest means to induce any strangers they found, to 

 come to our assistance, 

 nth. The eleventh was hot and sultry, like the preceding day. 

 In the morning we walked ten or eleven miles to the North 

 West, and then met a Northern Indian Leader, called Oule- 

 eye, and his family, who were, in company with several Copper 

 Indians, killing deer with bows and arrows and spears, as they 

 crossed a little river, by the side of which we put up, as did 

 also the above-mentioned Indians.* That afternoon I smoked 

 my calumet of peace with these strangers, and found them a 

 quite different set of people, at least in principle, from those I 

 had seen at Congecathawhachaga : for though they had great 

 plenty of provisions, they neither offered me nor my com- 

 panions a mouthful, and would, if they had been permitted, 

 have taken the last garment from off my back, and robbed me 

 of every article I possessed. Even my Northern companions 

 could not help taking notice of such unaccountable behaviour. 

 Nothing but their poverty [143] protected them from being 

 plundered by those of my crew ; and had any of their women 

 been worth notice, they would most assuredly have been pressed 

 into our service. 

 i2th. Xhe twelfth was so exceedingly hot and sultry, that we 

 ^3^^' did not move ; but early in the morning of the thirteenth, 

 after my companions had taken what dry provisions they 

 chose from our unsociable strangers, we set out, and walked 

 about fifteen or sixteen miles to the North and North by East, 

 in expectation of arriving at the Copper-mine River that day ; 

 but when we had reached the top of a long chain of hills, 

 between which we were told the river ran, we found it to be 

 no more than a branch of it which empties itself into the main 

 river about forty miles from its influx into the sea. At that 



* This river runs nearly North East, and in all probability empties itself into 

 the Northern Ocean, not far from the Copper River. 



