206 Journal of a Voyage through the 



culty here was to procure a temporary separation from our 

 company, in order to hide some articles we could not carry 

 with us, and which it would have been imprudent to leave 

 in the power of the natives. Accordingly Mr. Mackay, 

 and one of our Indians embarked with them, and soon run 

 out of our sight. At our first hiding-place we left a bag of 

 pemmican, weighing ninety pounds, two bags of wild rice, 

 and a gallon keg of gunpowder. Previous to our putting 

 these articles in the ground, we rolled them up in oil cloth, 

 and dressed leather. In the second hiding-place, and 

 guarded with the same rollers, we hid two bags of Indian 

 corn, or maize, and a bale of different articles of merchan- 

 dize. When we had completed this important object, we 

 proceeded till half past eight, when we landed at the en- 

 trance of a small rivulet, where our friends were waiting 

 for us. 



Here it was necessarv that we should leave our canoe, 

 and whatever we could not carry on our backs. In the 

 first place, therefore, we prepared a stage, on which the 

 canoe was placed bottom upwards, and shaded by a cover- 

 ing of small trees and branches, to keep her from the sun. 

 We then built an oblong hollow square, ten feet by five, of 

 green logs, wherein we placed every article it was neces- 

 sary for us to leave here, and covered the whole with large 

 pieces of timber. 



While we were eagerly employed in this necessary busi- 

 ness, our guide and his companions were so impatient to 

 be gone, that we could not persuade the former to wait till 

 we were prepared for our departure, and we had some 

 difficulty in persuading another of the natives to remain, 

 who had undertook to conduct us where the guide had pro- 

 raised to wait our arrival. 



At noon we were in a state of preparation to enter the 

 woods, an undertaking of which I shall not here give any 

 preliminary opinion, but leave those who read it to judge 

 for themselves. 



We carried on our backs four bags and an half of pem- 

 mican, weighing from eighty-five to ninety pounds each; 

 a case with my instruments, a parcel of goods for presents, 

 weighing ninety pounds, and a parcel containing ammuni- 

 tion of the same weight. Each of the Canadians had a 

 burden of about ninety pounds, with a gun, and some am- 

 munition. The Indians had about forty-five pounds weight 

 of pemmican to carry, besides their gun, &c. with which 



