278 A JOURNEY TO THE 



1772. where in the evenings, or in the morning before they set out, 

 ■ they reduce it with their knives to the shape and size which 

 is required. 



Provisions being plentiful, and the weather fine, we ad- 



19th. vanced a little each day ; and on the nineteenth took up our 

 lodgings by the side of Wholdyeah-chuck'd Whoie, or Large 

 Pike Lake. In our way we crossed another small lake, where 

 we caught some trout by angling, and killed a few deer and 

 one moose. 



20th. On the twentieth we crossed Large Pike Lake, which at 

 that part was not more than seven miles wide ; but from 

 North North West to the South South East is much longer. 

 The next day we arrived at Bedodid Lake,^ which in general 

 is not more than three miles wide, and in several places much 

 less ; but it is upward of forty miles long, which gives it the 

 appearance of a river. It is said by the Indians to be shut up 

 on all sides, and entirely surrounded with high land, which 

 produces vast quantity of fir trees, but none of them grow to 

 a great height in those parts : their branches, however, spread 

 wider than those of firs of three times their height and thick- 

 ness do in Europe ; so that they resemble an apple-tree in 

 shape, [282] more than any species of the pine. They seem 

 rich in tar, as the wood of them will burn like a candle, and 

 emit as strong a smell, and as much black smoke, as the staves 

 of an old tar-barrel ; for which reason no Indians chuse to burn 

 it in their tents, or even out of doors, for the purpose of cook- 

 ing their victuals. 



The thaws began now to be very considerable, and the 

 under-woods were so thick in these parts as to render travel- 

 ling through them very difficult ; we therefore took the 

 advantage of walking on the ice of the above-mentioned Lake, 



{} The positions of these two lakes are not exactly known, but they doubt- 

 less lie near the regular Indian canoe route from the north Bay of Lake Atha- 

 basca to Great Slave Lake. The latter lake lies fourteen miles W. or S.W. of 

 Noo-shetht Lake.] 



