rculation, upon strong grounds of suspicion, that a most deliberate
and barbarous murder had been committed by one of the half-breeds on a
Canadian freeman. He was supposed to have been instigated to the bloody
deed by a woman he lived with, and whom he received from the Canadian
for so many buffaloes as provision. Evidence however was wanting, it
was thought, that would justify his being sent down to Montreal, or to
England for trial, to convict him there; as there was no criminal
jurisdiction established within the territories of the Hudson's Bay
Company.

MARCH 25.--The thaw has come on unexpectedly early, and caused many of
the hunters to return from the plains with scarcely any provisions.
There were a few tame buffaloes that had been reared in the colony,
which have been slaughtered, and to save as much seed corn as possible,
the allowance of grain is given out to the settlers with the most rigid
economy by the Charge d'Affaires. There was a general shout to day in
the Settlement at the sight of some swans and geese, as the sure
harbingers of Spring, and of immense flocks of wild fowl, that bend
their course in the Spring to the north, as in the fall of the year
they fly to the south. It was indeed a cheerful sight, as nearly all
the feathered tribe leave us during a long and severe winter. In this
season, we hear only, and that but very seldom the croaking of the
raven, the chattering of the magpie, or the tapping of the woodpecker.
But as summer bursts upon us, the call of the whip-poor-will is heard
in the dusk of the evening, and the solitude of the woods is enlivened
with a rich variety of birds, some of which dazzle the eye with the
beauty of their colours. They have no notes however in their gay
plumage, or melody of sound, which catch, and delight the ear. The wild
fowl are mere birds of passage at the Red River, and but few were shot,
as they passed over the colony, for our relief, in the want of
provisions. Our numbers increased almost daily, from the return of the
settlers from the plains, and it was the general opinion that it would
be far better to kill all the horses and dogs in the Settlement for
food, than distribute the whole of the grain, so as to be without seed
corn.

APRIL 5.--One of the chief officers of the Hudson's Bay Company
arrived, and gave us the welcome promise, (before we were actually
driven to the above extremity,) that the Colony should receive some
wheat to sow from the Company