Page:Narrative of the Discoveries on the North Coast of America.djvu/391

Rh all idea of the true direction, few of them being able to indicate it within eight points of the compass. I even overheard one stoutly maintaining, in a cloudy day, that west was east! Our Indian companions were quite as wide of the mark as the rest; and I was now fully convinced that their peculiar faculty of finding their way over pathless wilds has its origin in memory, in the habitual observation and retention of local objects, even the most trifling, which a white man, less interested in storing up such knowledge, would pass without notice.

On the last day of July we encamped near the mouth of a river, much larger than the Coppermine, with a strong current, that freshened the water among the reefs for some distance from the shore. Its banks appeared much frequented at this season by reindeer and musk-cattle, and no fewer than five fat bucks were killed by some of the party while the rest were pitching the tents and preparing supper, A couple of Esquimaux sledges lay by the river side; and as we had found many old stone caches, both upon islands and points of the mainland, it seemed more than probable that, like the natives near the Coppermine, the people to whom they belonged had come from their winter stations over the ice in June to ascend this fine