reports, was actuated by a mistaken idea that he was serving the
interest of his employers. On the present occasion we felt indebted to
him for the sympathy he displayed for our distresses, and the kindness
with which he administered to our personal wants. After this conference
such Indians as were indebted to the Company were paid for the provision
they had given us by deducting a corresponding sum from their debts; in
the same way we gave a reward of sixteen skins of beaver to each of the
persons who had come to our relief at Fort Enterprise. As the debts of
Akaitcho and his hunters had been effaced at the time of his engagement
with us we placed a sum equal to the amount of provision they had
recently supplied to their credit on the Company's books. These things
being, through the moderation of the Indians, adjusted with an unexpected
facility, we gave them a keg of mixed liquors (five parts water) and
distributed among them several fathoms of tobacco, and they retired to
their tents to spend the night in merriment.

Adam, our interpreter, being desirous of uniting himself with the Copper
Indians, applied to me for his discharge which I granted, and gave him a
bill on the Hudson's Bay Company for the amount of his wages. These
arrangements being completed we prepared to cross the lake.

Mr. Weeks provided Dr. Richardson and I with a cariole each and we set
out at eleven A.M. on the 15th for Moose-Deer Island. Our party consisted
of Belanger who had charge of a sledge laden with the bedding and drawn
by two dogs, our two cariole men, Benoit and Augustus. Previous to our
departure we had another conference with Akaitcho who, as well as the
rest of his party, bade us farewell with a warmth of manner rare among
the Indians.

The badness of Belanger's dogs and the roughness of the ice impeded our
progress very much and obliged us to encamp early. We had a good fire
made of the driftwood which lines the shores of this lake in great
quantities. The next day was very cold. We began the journey at nine A.M.
and encamped at the Big Cape, having made another short march in
consequence of the roughness of the ice.

On the 17th we encamped on the most southerly of the Reindeer Islands.
This night was very stormy but, the wind abating in the morning, we
proceeded and by sunset reached the fishing-huts of the Company at Stony
Point. Here we found Mr. Andrews, a clerk of the Hudson's Bay Company,
who regaled us with a supper of