ives took their furs to
Hudson's Bay, or sold to the French Canadian traders, who," he adds,
"visited this part of the country as early as 1697." If so, the
credit for the discovery of the Saskatchewan has been wrongly given
to the Chevalier, as he was called, a son of Varenne, Sieur de la
Varendrye.

Franklin left Cumberland in January, 1820, by dog train for
Chipewyan, via Fort Carlton and Green Lake. Fort Carlton was the
great food supply post, then and long afterwards, of the Hudson's
Bay Company, buffalo and wapiti being very abundant. The North-West
Company's fort, called La Montee, was three miles beyond Carlton,
and harbored seventy French Canadians and sixty women and children,
who consumed seven hundred pounds of meat daily, the ration being
eight pounds. This post was at that time in charge of Mr. Hallett,
a forebear, if I mistake not, of my old friend, William Hallett,
leader of the English Plain Hunt, and a distinguished loyalist in
the rebellion of 1869.

Franklin and Back left Fort Carlton on the 8th February, and
reached Green Lake on the 17th. The North-West Company's post at
the lake was managed by Dugald Cameron, and that of the Hudson's
Bay Company by a Mr. MacFarlane, and, having been equipped at
both posts with carioles, sledges and provisions, they left
"under a fusillade from the half-breed women." From the end of
the lake they followed for a short distance a small river, then
"crossed the woods to Beaver River, and proceeding along it,
passed the mouths of two rivers, the latter of which, they were
told, was a channel by which the Indians go to Lesser Slave
Lake." On the 11th of March they reached Methy Lake--so called
from an unwholesome fish of the burbot species found there,
only the liver of which is fit to eat--crossed the Methy
portage on the 13th, and, amidst a chaos of vast ravines and
the wildest of scenery, descended the next day to the Clearwater
River. Thence they followed the Indian trail on the north bank,
passing a noted scene, "a romantic defile of limestone rocks
like Gothic ruins," and, crossing a small stream, found pure
sulphur deposited by springs and smelling very strongly. On
the 17th they got to the junction of the Clearwater with the
Athabasca, where Port McMurray now stands, and next day reached
the Pierre an Calumet post, in charge of a Mr. Stewart, who
had twice crossed the mountains to the Pacific coast. The
place got its name from a soft stone found there, of w