OF A NORTH-WEST PASSAGE. 



391 



personally known to us, assured me, as many others had done, that wood 1823 - 

 was abundant at the place above alluded to. He explained, however, pretty J <!S^i;' 

 intelligibly, that it did not grow there, as we had at first been given to 

 understand ; and upon the whole it seems most probable that the wood of 

 which the Esquimaux speak is drift-wood. That wood should occur in one spot 

 only out of a large extent of coast, suggested to us at the time the idea that 

 it might have been brought there by the current of some river setting it 

 down from the interior of the continent, as on the northern shores of Asia 

 and Europe. The researches of Captain Franklin, however, with which we 

 were then unacquainted, have furnished a more satisfactory mode of account- 

 ing for this fact ; the wood being probably deposited at Seat-toke by the 

 current observed to set from the westward along the northern coast of 

 America, and bringing with it quantities of drift-wood seen by Captain 

 Franklin on those shores along which his late extraordinary canoe-navigation 

 was performed. 



On the 23d Takkee-likkee-ta came to the Hecla according to his promise, Thur. 23. 

 and was supplied with various comforts for his wife and child. As how- 

 ever their principal want of comfort arose from the coldness and moisture of 

 their present quarters, Captain Lyon proposed to him to bring them to the 

 Hecla. To this the man joyfully assented and, being furnished with 

 a sledge and dogs, soon brought the invalids on board, where they were 

 comfortably lodged in Captain Lyon's cabin, and attended with all the 

 care that their situation required, and that humanity could suggest. Besides 

 the child that was ill, another also accompanied them named Shiga, a 

 pleasing and uncommonly intelligent girl about eleven years of age, whom 

 we now found to have been one of the individuals I saw in Lyon Inlet 

 during the summer of 1821. In the evening I sent my servant to the vil- 

 lage, for the purpose of going into all the huts (which from the lowness and 

 indescribable filth of the passages was no easy or pleasant task) to see what 

 other sick there might be. He reported, on his return, that a young man 

 named Piccooyak, a great favourite with our officers and ship's company, was 

 in a very weak condition, and that his wife and another female were lying 

 beside him to keep him warm, at the same time crying most piteously. 

 Early on the following morning, therefore, I despatched Mr. Crawford on Frid. 24. 

 the sledge to bring Piccooyak to the ship ; but alas ! his miseries here were 

 at an end, for he had breathed his last on the preceding evening within an 

 hour after we had first been informed of his illness ! His wife Kaga, a 



