OF THE POLAR SEA. 



491 



I have little now to add to the melancholy detail into which I 

 felt it proper to enter ; but I cannot omit to state, that the unre- 

 mitting care and attentions of our kind friends, Mr. M 'Vicar and 

 Mr. M'Auley, together with the improvement of our diet, mate- 

 rially contributed to the restoration of our health ; so that, by the 

 end of February, the swellings of our limbs, which had returned 

 upon us, had entirely subsided, and we were able to walk to any 

 part of the island. Our appetites gradually moderated, and we 

 nearly regained our ordinary state of body before the spring. Hep- 

 burn alone suffered from a severe attack of rheumatism, which con- 

 fined him to his bed for some weeks. The usual symptoms of 

 spring having appeared, on the 25th of May we prepared to embark 

 for Fort Chipewyan. Fortunately, on the following morning, a 

 canoe arrived from that place with the whole of the stores which 

 we required for the payment of Akaitcho and the hunters. It was 

 extremely gratifying to us to be thus enabled, previous to our 

 departure, to make arrangements respecting the payment of our 

 late Indian companions ; and the more so, as we had recently dis- 

 covered that Akaitcho, and the whole of the tribe, in consequence 

 of the death of the leader's mother, and the wife of our old guide 

 Keskarrah, had broken and destroyed every useful article belonging 

 to them, and that they were in the greatest distress. It was an 

 additional pleasure to find our stock of ammunition was more than 

 sufficient to pay them what was due, and that we could make a 

 considerable present of this most essential article to every individual 

 that had been attached to the Expedition. 



We quitted Moose-deer Island at five P.M., on the 26th, accom- 

 panied by Mr. M'Vicar and Mr. M'Auley, and nearly all the 

 voyagers at the establishment, having resided there about five 

 months, not a day of which had passed without our having cause 

 of gratitude, for the kind and unvaried attentions of Mr. M'Vicar 

 and Mr. M'Auley. These gentlemen accompanied us as far as Fort 



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