OF THE POLAR SEA. 



187 



We were here furnished with a canoe by 

 Mr. Smith, and a bowman, to act as our 

 guide ; and having left Fort Chipewyan on 

 the 5th, we arrived, on the 4th of July, at 

 Norway House. Finding at this place that 

 canoes were about to go down to Montreal, 

 I gave all our Canadian voyagers their dis- 

 charges, and sent them by those vessels, 

 furnishing them with orders on the Agent 

 of the Hudson's Bay Company, for the 

 amount of their wages. We carried Au- 

 gustus down to York Factory, where we 



prise, it was because, by some mischance, you 

 had forgot to give me paper when we parted.* 



" I, however, wrote this news on a plank, in 

 pencil, and placed it in the top of your former 

 bedstead, where I left it. Since it has not been 

 found there, some Indians must have gone to 

 the house after my departure, and destroyed it. 

 These details, Sir, I have been induced to enter 

 into (rather unexpectedly) in justification of my- 

 self, and hope it will be satisfactory." 



* I certainly offered Mr. Wentzel some paper when 

 he quitted us, but he declined it, having then a note- 

 book ; and Mr. Back gave him a pencil. 



