70 ARRIVAL AT THE COAST 



Again we camped on the other side. Next morning, after travel- 

 ling a mile, we came to a much larger river and this time we had 

 to make a raft of dried trees and took our baggage across and 

 drove our horses. In this manner we travelled over land by the 

 lake for four days. On the evening of the fourth day we camped 

 in a meadow of very tall grass and at this point was the crossing 

 to the Little Slave Lake Post, which was close to the head of the 

 lake. Mr. Horetzky fired off a gun to let the people at the Post 

 know that we wanted help to get across but we got no word from 

 the Post. Two Indians who had been out hunting came up just 

 then; each had an old flint-lock gun of the Hudson's Bay Com- 

 pany's type. The following quotation is Mr. Horetzky's des- 

 cription of this meeting : 



"Those fellows were dressed in the unmistakable Hudson's 

 Bay capot and were each armed with an old flint-lock gun with 

 which they rather astonished our Botanist. A flock of grey geese 

 happening to pass at a short distance, Mr. Macoun pointed to 

 them, and by signs signified his desire to see them shoot. The 

 two aborigines motioning to us to keep quiet immediately began 

 to imitate the cackling of geese and looking up we saw the flock 

 swerve slightly in their course and turn in our direction. When 

 within shooting distance, although to our unpracticed eyes were 

 yet too far off, bang, bang, went the guns and a couple of plump 

 geese fell into the grass beside us. A plug of tobacco each, in 

 payment, was received by the Indians with evident marks of 

 pleasure and they good-naturedly set to work collecting fire-wood 

 and doing other little chores of the camp." 



While we were setting out our supper the Indians pointed to 

 a canoe which was coming up and we found that it was our two 

 friends, the Hudson's Bay clerks, Messrs. Young and King, who 

 said we would not see them again until we got to Fort McLeod. 

 We hailed them and they promised to have a boat sent over for 

 us in the morning. 



On the twenty-ninth of September we started from Little 

 Slave Lake for Peace River Crossing with a set of new horses. 

 As usual, I took the lead and went forward a day ahead of Mr. 

 Horetzky, and made very good progress and, after an uneventful 



