140 EXPLORATION OF THE PRAIRIES, 1879 



North West at that time. My instructions were to go by this 

 road to the 102nd Meridian and from there I was to travel by 

 compass to the head of Long Lake. The 102nd Meridian was 

 marked on this road so that there was no possible chance of 

 my missing it. This was the initial point of my expedition and 

 I learned, a few years after, that the reason I started at the 102nd 

 Meridian was that Captain Palliser had said in his report that 

 the "Desert" commenced there. 



Our mode of procedure, from this time forward, was for Mr. 

 Wilkins, in his buckboard, to lead and give the direction, while 

 the carts followed him, and I brought up the rear in my buckboard. 

 This was the way we travelled for two months. Our direction 

 was a little north of west and we aimed to travel at least eight 

 hours a day and make about sixteen miles. We had an odometer 

 on one of the carts and knew how far we travelled each day. Mr. 

 Wilkins, at night, in his tent, made a map of our trip at two miles 

 to an inch so that we could see where we were and how many 

 miles we made each day. I noticed that the cart in charge of 

 certain of the men was often in difficulty and sometimes over- 

 turned and at last I had to pass a law that any man who allowed 

 anything in his cart to be injured, the value of it would be stopped 

 out of his pay. From this time forward we had no more mishaps, 

 each man walked beside his horse and saw that he got into no 

 difficulty. 



Days passed, and we saw no travellers nor roads and had few 

 difficulties, but a most wonderful country full of flowers and 

 copse-wood and small streams and, altogether it was a most de- 

 lightful place. Everywhere we looked, it was the same. One 

 day, when we were crossing the open prairie, two policemen 

 suddenly came up with us and wanted to know our business. 

 They had noticed our ironbound carts and knew that they were 

 a different kind of vehicle from any they had seen in the country 

 before. One of the policemen was Inspector Griesbach. 



We were now about due west of Qu'Appelle Station, where 

 the policemen had their quarters. Of course, we had no means of 

 knowing where we were as our map was very poor. We found 

 no difficulty in crossing the country. There was plenty of water, 



