190 TRAVELS THROUGH LOWER CANADA ! 
routes was most suited to our inclination, but 
we soon found that we must give over all 
thoughts of proceeding by it, ' The way to 
have proceeded would have been to set out on 
horseback, taking with us sufficient provisions 
to last for a journey through a forest of up¬ 
wards of two hundred miles in length, and. 
trusting our horses to the food which they 
could pick up for themselves amongst the 
bushes. There was no possibility of procur¬ 
ing horses, however, for hire at Detroit or in 
the neighbourhood; and had we purchased 
them, which could not have been done but at a 
most exorbitant price, we should have found 
it a difficult matter perhaps to have got rid of 
them when we had ended our land journeyy 
unless indeed we chose to turn them adrift in 
the w oods, which would not have been per¬ 
fectly suitable to our finances. But indepen¬ 
dent of this consideration, there was another 
obstacle in our way, and that was the difficulty 
of procuring guides. The Indians were all 
preparing to set out on their hunting'excur¬ 
sions-; and had we even been able to have 
procured a party of them for an escort, there 
would have been some risk, w r e were told, of 
their deserting us before we reached our jour¬ 
ney’s end. If they fell in on their journey 
with a hunting party that had been very suc¬ 
cessful ; if they came to a place where there 
