Page:A biographical dictionary of eminent Scotsmen, vol 9.djvu/158

422 sent out on an exploring expedition through the regions lying to the northwest of their station at this time still a terra incognita to British exploration, and supposed to be bounded by the Arctic Ocean. Upon this Argonautic quest he accordingly set off, in a canoe of birch bark, from Fort Chipewyan, on the south side'of the Lake of the Hills, on June 3, 1789. His crew consisted of a German, four Canadians, two of whom were attended by their wives, and an Indian chief; and in a smaller boat were the chiefs two wives, and two of his young men who were to serve as hunters and interpreters: a third canoe that followed was in charge of one of the company's clerks, and carried also their provisions, clothing, and ammunition, as well as mercantile presents for the Indians along whose territories they would have to pass. This voyage, which continued 102 days, was of a sufficiently eventful character; and the difficulties, dangers, and privations which the party encountered, as well as the courage, wisdom, and perseverance with which Mackenzie encountered and surmounted them, can scarcely be appreciated in the present day, when the districts which he visited have now become familiar, while the wild tenants by whom they were occupied have disappeared. Six days after he had embarked on the Slave River he reached the Slave Lake, that was almost wholly frozen over; and after encamping six days among the ice, that sometimes gave way under them, he once more embarked, and skirting along the edge of the lake, he reached, on the 29th of June, the entrance of the river which flows from its western extremity, afterwards called, in honour of his discovery, the Mackenzie River. On the 15th of July, the principal purpose of his search was crowned with success, for after having followed the north-west course of the river, he arrived at the great Northern Ocean, in lat. 69°. After having erected a post at the place of discovery, on which he engraved the latitude of the place, his own name, and the number of persons who accompanied him, he retraced his course, and arrived in safety at Chipewyan Fort, on the 12th of September.

After little more than a year of repose at home, or rather a year of active trading, the bold traveller was alert upon a new journey, and one of greater importance than the former, being nothing less than an attempt to reach the Pacific an adventure which no European in North America had as yet accomplished, or, as far as is known, had even attempted. Again, therefore, he left Fort Chipewyan, on the 10th of October, 1792, and proceeded up the Peace River. "I had resolved," he says, "to go as far as our most distant settlement, which would occupy the remaining part of the season, it being the route by which I proposed to attempt my next discovery, across the mountains from the source of that river; for whatever distance I could reach this fall would be a proportionate advancement of my voyage." He set off, accompanied by two canoes laden with the necessary articles of trade, and prosecuted the enterprise partly by water and partly by land. The dangers he underwent were, if possible, still greater than before, not merely from natural obstacles, but the hostility or the blunders of the wild tribes with whom he came in contact; and it is strange, as well as not a little interesting, to read in his narrative, not only of manners that are fast disappearing from the world, but of large Indian communities that have either dwindled into families, or utterly passed away. After nine months of persevering travel his aim was accomplished, for he had penetrated across the mountains, and through the North American continent, to the shores of the Pacific; and having reached the point of his ambition, he mixed up some vermilion in melted grease, and inscribed upon a rock on which he had passed the