A General History of the Fur Trade. 



61 



At a small distance from Portage la Loche, several car- 

 rying-places interrupt the navigation of the river; about the 

 middle of which are some mineral springs, whose margins 

 are covered with sulphureous incrustations. At the junc- 

 tion or fork, the Elk River is about three quarters of a 

 mile in breadth, and runs in a steady current, sometimes 

 contracting, but never increasing its channel, until, after 

 receiving several small streams, it discharges itself into the 

 Lake of the Hills, in latitude 58. 36. North. At about 

 twenty-four miles from the fork, are some bilumenous foun- 

 tains, into which a pole of twenty feet long may be inserted 

 without the least resistance. The bitumen is in a fluid state, 

 and when mixed with gum, or the resinous substance col- 

 lected from the spruce fir, serves to gum the canoes. In 

 its heated state it emits a smell like that of sea-coal. The 

 banks of the river, which are there very elevated, discover 

 veins of the same bitumenous quality. At a small distance 

 from the fork, houses have been erected for the convenience 

 of trading with a party of the Knisteneaux, who visit the 

 adjacent country for the purpose of hunting. 



At the distance of about forty miles from the lake, is the 

 Old Establishment, which has been already mentioned, as 

 formed by Mr. Pond in the year 1778-9, and which was the 

 only one in this part of the world, until the year 1785. In 

 the year 1788, it was transferred to the Lake of the Hills, 

 and formed on a point on its Southern side, at about eight 

 miles from the discharge of the river. It was named Fort 

 Chepewyan, and is in latitude 58. 38. North, longitude 110. 

 26. West, and much better situated for trade and fishing, 

 as the people here have recourse to water for their support. 



This being the place which I made my head-quarters for 

 eight years, and from whence I took my departure, on both 

 my expeditions, I shall give some account of it, with the 

 manner of carrying on the trade there, and other circum- 

 stances connected with it. 



The laden canoes which leave Lake la Pluie about the 

 first of August, do not arrive here till the latter end of 

 September, or the beginning of October, when a necessary 

 proportion of them is dispatched up the Peace River to 

 trade with the Beaver and Rocky-Mountain Indians. — 

 Others are sent to the Slave River and Lake, or beyond 

 them, and traffic with the inhabitants of that country. A 

 small part of them, if not left at the Fork of the Elk Ri- 

 ver, return thither for the Knisteneaux, while the rest of 



