THE KED RIVER EXPEDITION. 241 



The Hudson Bay officers best acquainted with the 

 country, reported that we could not calculate upon 

 being able to get through the higher region over 

 which the route lay after the end of September. 

 Every day was therefore of consequence ; for al- 

 though it was intended to leave the militia regi- 

 ments at Fort Garry for the winter, instructions had 

 been received from the home authorities that the 

 regular troops should be brought back from the Red 

 Eiver before the winter set in, if it was possible to do 

 so. This was not the only incentive to haste ; for 

 every mail from the north-west brought urgent ap- 

 peals from its inhabitants, praying for the earliest 

 possible arrival of the force amongst them. Alarm, 

 and a dread of some unknown evil, seemed to have 

 possessed their minds ; men had begun to suspect 

 one another, and no one knew to whom to look for 

 either comfort or safety : all eyes and thoughts were 

 bent upon the expeditionary force as the sole chance 

 of deliverance from the bondage, both of mind and 

 body, to which every loyal man was there subjected. 



As already stated, the Ottawa authorities had 

 announced that the road from Thunder Bay to She- 

 bandowan Lake would be fit for traffic before the 

 end of May; whereas by that date not more than 

 thirty miles of it were finished, and many miles 

 were still uncut through the primeval forest. A 

 rumour got abroad amongst the regular troops that 

 the Canadian authorities were not very anxious to 



