THE TRIP TO WAHPOOSKOW 14S 



was to the habitation of another half-breed family at the 

 foot of Sandy Lake, themselves and everything about them 

 orderly, clean and neat; the very opposites of the curious- 

 household we had visited the day before. They had a great 

 kettle of fish on the fire, which we bought, and had our 

 dinner there; being especially pleased to note that their 

 dogs were not starved, but were fat and well handled. At 

 the east side of the lake we were delayed trying to catch 

 ponies to make the portage, failing which we got over other- 

 wise by dark, and camped again on the Pelipan River. That, 

 night there was a keen frost, and ice formed along shore, but 

 the weather was delightfully crisp and clear, and we reached 

 Pelican Landing on the 9th, finding there our old scow 

 and the trackers, with our friend Cyr in command, and 

 Marchand, our congenial cook, awaiting us. 



On the 11th we set off for Athabasca Landing, accom- 

 panied by a little fleet of trippers' and traders' canoes, and 

 passed during the day immense banks of shale, the track- 

 ing being very bad and the water still high. We noted much, 

 good timber standing on heavy soil, and on the 14th passed 

 a curious hump-like hill, cut-faced, with a reddish and yel- 

 low cinder-like look, as if it had been calcined by underlying- 

 fires. Near it was an exposure of deep coloured ochre, and, 

 farther on, enormous black cut-banks, also suggestive of coal. 



The Calling River — " Kitoosepe " — ^was one of our points 

 of distribution, and upon reaching it we found the river- 

 benches covered with tepees, and a crowd of half-breeds from 

 Calling Lake awaiting us. After the declarations and scrip 

 payments were concluded, we took stock of the surroundings, 

 which consisted, so far as numbers went, mainly of dogs. 

 Nearly all of them looked very miserable, and one starveling 

 bitch, with a litter of pups, seemed to live upon air. It 

 was pitiful to see the forlorn brutes so cruelly abused; but 

 it has been the fate of this poor mongrel friend of humanity 

 from the first. The canine gentry fare better than many a 

 man, but the outcasts of the slums and camps feel the stroke- 



