fifteen, or
at the utmost eighteen inches deep. As the climate of a country is not
known by merely measuring its distance from the equator, but is
affected differently in the same parallel of latitude by its locality,
and a variety of circumstances, we find that of Red River, though
situated in the same parallel, far different from, and intensely more
cold than, that of England. The thermometer is frequently at 30 deg. and
40 deg. below zero, when it is only about freezing point in the latter
place. This difference is probably occasioned by the prevailing
north-westerly wind, that blows with piercing keenness over the rocky
mountains, or Andes, which run from north to south through the whole
Continent, and over a country which is buried in ice and snow.

As my instructions were to afford religious instruction and consolation
to the servants in the active employment of the Hudson's Bay Company,
as well as to the Company's retired servants, and other inhabitants of
the settlement, upon such occasions as the nature of the country and
other circumstances would permit; I left the Forks[1] in a cariole
drawn by three dogs, accompanied by a sledge with two dogs, to carry
the luggage and provisions, and two men as drivers, on the 15th of
January, for Brandon House, and Qu'appelle, on the Assiniboine River.
After we had travelled about fifteen miles, we stopped on the edge of a
wood, and _bivouacked_ on the snow for the night. A large fire was
soon kindled, and a supply of wood cut to keep it up; when supper being
prepared and finished, I wrapped myself in my blankets and buffaloe
robe, and laid down with a few twigs under me in place of a bed, with
my feet towards the fire, and slept soundly under the open canopy of
heaven. The next morning we left our encampment before sunrise; and the
country as we passed presented some beautiful points and bluffs of
wood. We started again early the following morning, which was intensely
cold; and I had much difficulty in keeping my face from freezing, on my
way to the encampment rather late in the evening, at the '_Portage de
Praire_.' In crossing the plain the next morning, with a sharp head
wind, my nose and part of my face were frozen quite hard and white. I
was not conscious of it, till it was perceived by the driver, who
immediately rubbed the parts affected well with snow, and restored the
circulation, so that I suffered no inconvenience from the circumstance,
but was obliged to keep