Page:The frozen North; an account of Arctic exploration for use in schools (IA frozennorthaccou00hort).pdf/32

 *ing against the current of a river they run alongshore and drag the boat after them. This long and narrow boat is well suited for shooting rapids, through which it is guided by means of long poles. Sometimes the rapids are so swift that they cannot be navigated, and falls are often encountered. Then the cargoes are taken out of the boats and carried around the rapids or falls, and afterward the boats also are carried around. Such a place is called a portage.

The officers of the Hudson Bay Company, besides giving Franklin a boat, sent word to other trading posts throughout the country, to look out for him and to help him. The party, having secured boats and stores, started from York Factory to continue their journey. After traveling seven hundred miles, they reached another post called Cumberland House, where Franklin expected to find guides and hunters, but every one refused to undertake a journey so full of peril.

Franklin, though disappointed, was not discouraged. He left two men at Cumberland House to wait for supplies and to bring them on. Then, with Back and Hepburn, he started out with dog sledges for another trading post on Lake Athabasca. This journey was begun on January 18, 1820, in the middle of an Arctic winter of prolonged darkness. The suffering of these three explorers cannot be described. The temperature fell as low as 38° below zero, blizzards were common, and the party nearly perished. On some days the mercury froze in the thermometers, and the tea froze in the tin pots before it could be drunk.

At Lake Athabasca Franklin was joined by the men he had left at Cumberland House. They had secured some provisions, and now the entire party proceeded down the Slave river to Great Slave lake. They reached Fort