148 
BRITISH NORTH AMERICAN EXPEDITION. [Jan. 25, 1858. 
made up and transferred, I started on horseback, accompanied by 
M‘Kay and two of my men (who bad remained behind for the pur- 
pose), and overtook the expedition in three days at the Qui Appelle 
lakes, about 135 miles west of Fort Ellice. 
On Sunday, September 13th, we remained at the Qui Appelle 
lakes. Here the Hudson Bay Company have a small trading-post, 
the most western fort in the territory ; and there we found a large 
camp of Crees arrived for trading. I sent for Mr. Pratt, the mis- 
sionary, requesting him to come and pay us a visit. He is a pure 
Cree Indian, educated at Eed River. He reports the Crees as 
beginning to apprehend scarcity of buffalo, and many are most 
anxious to try agriculture. He thinks that if they bad agricultural 
implements, such as spades, hoes, and ploughs, they certainly would 
commence operations. This opinion I found pretty general among 
the people of the Hudson Bay Company ; and I am persuaded much 
good could he done by importing the simpler kinds of agricultural 
implements. Pratt has set the Indians an excellent example him- 
self, and grows capital Indian corn, barley, and potatoes. The Qui 
Appelle lakes may be considered the most western part of the ter- 
ritory east of the Rocky Mountains to which the Hudson Bay Com- 
pany trade : westward of this I may say is unknown, and the whole 
country in this latitude is untravelled by the white man. 
Among the Indians that had come to trade was a man Mr. 
M‘Kay was acquainted with. This man was a remarkable excep- 
tion to the generality of Indians : they call him the “ peace-maker,” 
and twice within the last two or three years he pushed his way 
alone into the Blackfoot country, and walked into the enemy’s 
camp unarmed, with the peace-pipe in his hand, exhorting them to 
peace, and offering them the alternative of killing him. The result 
on each occasion was a treaty of peace to the Crees and a present 
of horses to the peace-maker. I engaged this Indian to guide us to 
the Elbow. 
On September the 14th we started from Qui Appelle lakes for the 
Elbow, on the south branch of the Saskatchewan, sometimes called 
the Bow River. On September 16th we again camped on Mouse 
or Souris River, at a tributary called by the Indians, Moose Jaw 
Creek, in longitude 106°. • Up to this point in our journey we had 
suffered no inconvenience from want either of wood or water ; here, 
however, our guide, the peace-maker, advised us to bring wood 
along in our carts, as we should see no more until we came to the 
Saskatchewan, which we first came in sight of at sunset on the 21st 
of September. 
We were now in the heart of the buffalo country. This region 
