EXPLORATIONS ALONG THE NORTH-WEST COAST, AND THE WORK
OF THE HUDSON’S BAY AND NORTH-WEST COMPANIES.
TO bring our account of the course of discovery between the 30th
and 60th parallels of north latitude down to the date of the return
of Lewis and Clarke from their great expedition, we must join for a
moment some explorers of yet another nationality, who, from the North,
continued the work begun by the Spanish from the South, opening the
way for the completion by Englishmen of the examination of the Pacific
shore of America.
Early in the eighteenth century, the Russians, though they had failed
to round the most northern promontories of Asia, had penetrated to its
eastern shores, and were thus brought nearer to America than any other
European power. After the establishment of stations in Kamtschatka,
the efforts of the Russian Government were directed to ascertaining
whether the two great continents were or were not connected; and
when this question was partially set at rest in 1728 by Behring,
who reached the Asiatic side of the straits bearing his name, an
expedition was at once fitted out under his command for sailing direct
to the northern shores of America, and discovering if possible, the
long sought passage.
The story of the heroic struggle of Behring, and his melancholy
death after his discovery of the Aleutian and other islands, with the
adventures in the same latitudes of his comrade, Tchirikow, belongs
to the history of Arctic exploration. We mention them here, however,
as the openers of the north-western gate of the Pacific, their
discoveries having greatly simplified the problems still to be solved
between Cape Mendocino and the most southerly point reached by them.
The news of the existence of navigable straits between America and
Asia resulted in the turning of the attention of scientific men of
Europe to the North-west, and the relinquishment for a short time
of the efforts of navigators to reach the extreme North by way of
Davis Strait and Baffin’s Bay. The great navigator Cook was the first
to avail himself of the new passage. Not content with the splendid
results achieved in his first two voyages, he determined to make yet
another, and in his famous old ship, the _Resolution_, accompanied by
Captain Clarke in the _Discovery_, he sailed from Plymouth for the
third and last time on the 12th July, 1776.
Illustration: CAPTAIN JAMES COOK.
As is known to every schoolboy, Cook reached the Sandwich Islands
in safety, and, steering from them across the Pacific, he arrived
on the western coast of America, in about N. lat. 50°. Steering into
the inlet now known as Nootka Sound, between the island of the same
name and that now called Vancouver’s, the great explorer sailed up
the coast, passing between the modern Queen Charlotte’s Island and
the mainland. Cook, however, made no minute examination of its many
interesting phenomena, till he came to Cape Prince of Wales (N. lat.
65° 33′, W. long. 167° 59′), whence he made a flying visit to the
opposite coast before entering on the passage through Behring Straits,
which was the most noteworthy feature of this grand trip. Leaving him
to pursue his work to the bitter end which closed his splendid career,
we join, as the next hero to add any thing to our knowledge of that
portion of the north-west coast now under notice, Captain John Meares,
sent out in a vessel named the _Nootka_ by the merchants of India,
with orders to supplement Cook’s discoveries by every means in his
power.
The _Nootka_ reached the coast of America, in N. lat. 60° 20′, W.
long. 146° 30′, after a protracted voyage across the ♦Pacific. The
winter had already set in, and it appeared impossible to do any thing
in the way of exploration until the spring. Captain Meares, was,
however, unwilling to return without achieving any definite result,
and he therefore, in spite of the mutinous spirit of his men, resolved
to land on the shores of Prince William’s Sound, and at least gain
information respecting the natives of these remote latitudes.
♦ ‘Atlantic’ replaced with ‘Pacific’
The people of Alaska, a strong, large-limbed, and tall race, with
flat faces, high cheek-bones, and small, bead-like black eyes, who
delighted in disfiguring their lips and noses with pendent ornaments,
seem to have stood in considerable awe of their visitors, and supplied
them with game and fish in abundance during the first few weeks of
their stay. Early in November, however, all the terrors of the winter
closed in upon the exiles; food became scarce, and, in January, scurvy
in its most awful forms broke out among them. When the hoped-for
spring of the ensuing year, which was to effect so much, at last set
in, half the men of the expedition had found their last resting-places
beneath the snow, and the survivors were reduced to the greatest
extremities.
At this critical juncture two English trading vessels hove in sight,
and from their captains, Portlock and Dixon, relief was obtained,
though it seems to have been very grudgingly given, Meares being
looked upon as an intruder likely to interfere with the profits of
the fisheries. Before food was given to his starving men, a promise
was exacted from him that he would not trade on the coast, and he was
therefore compelled to return to the Sandwich Islands just as he might
have begun his work of exploration.
Nothing daunted by this first failure, we find Meares starting again
for the North in January, 1788, this time in command of two vessels,
the _Felice_ and _Iphigenia_, and with a crew devoted to his service.
After an interesting voyage across the Pacific, and a short halt in
King George’s Sound, our hero reached the Straits of Juan de Fuca,
discovered, as we have seen, two centuries before by a Greek pilot of
that name. Here the vessels were overtaken by a terrible storm, and,
the rugged buttresses of Vancouver’s Island offering no shelter, their
captains were compelled to steer for the south. The rocky shores of
the modern Territory of Washington, then dotted with Indian villages,
the mouth of the Columbia River, the pine-clad heights of Oregon, were
passed in rapid succession――the names of Shoalwater Bay, Deception
Bay, Destruction Island, and Cape Disappointment, given by Meares to
the most noteworthy features of the scenery, still bearing witness to
his despondency when thus driven in the opposite direction to that in
which he judged his work to be awaiting him.
The early summer found the explorers off the coast of Northern
California, then still known as New Albion, and after an unsuccessful,
because probably a not very hearty effort to examine its fertile
bays, the vessels were once more turned northward, with Nootka Sound
as their goal. The weather being now more propitious, Meares sent a
number of his men in one of the long-boats up the Straits of Juan de
Fuca, with orders to examine them thoroughly. The sailors, weary of
their long detention on shipboard, started on this trip with eager
delight; but when day after day passed by, and there were no signs
of their return, their master became uneasy in their behalf. At
last, after a long period of suspense, the boat was seen issuing from
the narrow inlet, and an eager shout of joy from the large vessels
hailed the fact that the numbers of the men were undiminished. But
why did they row so slowly, and what was the meaning of their air of
exhaustion and dejection? As they came nearer, their comrades saw that
each one of them was bleeding from terrible wounds, and when they had
been helped up the ship-ladders, they told how they had been attacked
as they rowed up the straits by two canoes full of armed warriors,
and only escaped after a terrible struggle, which would probably have
ended in the massacre of them all, had not the death of the native
chief struck terror into his subjects’ hearts. As the dusky leader
fell with a ball lodged in his brain, his warriors took to flight,
and the English, bleeding from their wounds, made the best of their
way back to their vessels.
Back again at last at Nootka Sound, fresh difficulties arose. The men,
so loyal at first, showed signs of mutiny, and the chief offenders
were sent on shore, where, falling into the hands of native chiefs,
they endured much hardship, from which they were finally rescued
by Meares, who received them back into his service, after repeated
professions of contrition.
As will be understood, so much time had been lost in the détour to the
south, that little was effected in the way of actual discovery on this
second trip. Forts were, however, erected at several points on the
shores of Nootka Sound, and a cargo of great value was taken back by
Meares to his employers――two facts which paved the way for the fitting
out of an important expedition, consisting of several vessels, under
the great Vancouver, who added more than any of his predecessors to
our scientific knowledge of the north-western shores of America.
De Fuca, Meares, and others of lesser note, had, throughout their
examination of the new districts discovered by them, divided their
attention between trade and geographical exploration. Vancouver
appears to us to have been a man of a different and more intellectual
stamp; and though he can scarcely be said to have been the first
to _see_ the important island named after him, as it can not have
escaped the observation of any mariners anchoring in Nootka Sound,
he undoubtedly revealed the fact of its complete separation from the
mainland, and won recognition for its great natural resources and its
commanding geographical position.
Between the return home of Meares and the starting of Vancouver,
disputes had arisen between the English and Spanish, as to which were
the true owners of the lands from whence came the treasures brought
home by the now numerous traders and whalers who frequented the
Northern Pacific waters. These disputes were finally adjusted by the
acceptance by the Spanish Government of Cape Mendocino (N. lat. 40°
20′) as the most northerly limit of its jurisdiction in the New World.
As a result, Vancouver’s work was limited to the examination of the
coast above that boundary; and with the understanding that he should
not encroach below it, he started from England on his grand voyage on
the 15th December, 1790, arriving off the coast of America, in N. lat.
37° 55′, about the 15th April of the ensuing year.
True to his instructions, Vancouver attempted no exploration of New
Albion until he had passed Cape Mendocino, beyond which, however,
he kept as close as possible inshore, noting the position of every
prominent feature of the coast, and seeking in vain for any harbor
in which to anchor his vessels. Past Cape Blanco (N. lat. 42° 51′),
to which the leader gave the name of Orford, in honor of the English
nobleman bearing that title, Cape Disappointment (N. lat. 46° 19′),
and many another now well-known promontory, the little fleet slowly
sailed, until, on the last day of April, the Straits of De Fuca were
entered, and those discoveries began which opened a new era in our
geographical knowledge of North-west America.
Entering the straits once supposed to lead direct into the Arctic
Ocean, and carefully observing every peculiarity, alike of the shores
of the long narrow island on the left and of the mainland on the
right, our hero successfully navigated the Gulf of Georgia, crossed
the 50th parallel of north latitude, and early in the summer of 1792,
discovered the open sea-way leading back into the Pacific, to which he
gave the name of Queen Charlotte’s Sound.
The erroneous opinion still held by many, that the Straits of De Fuca
were identical with the long-sought Gulf of Anian, and led direct to
the Arctic Ocean, was now finally dispelled; and, resuming his survey
of the Pacific seaboard beyond the most northerly limit of Vancouver’s
Island, the explorer next turned his attention to the labyrinth of
sounds, inlets, and islands known as Prince of Wales, Duke of York,
Admiralty, etc., the intricate windings of which had so long baffled
the captains of trading and fishing vessels.
Before the close of the summer, the mouth of the supposed river,
known as Cook’s, flowing from Alaska into the Pacific a little above
the 60th parallel of north latitude, was reached, and, sailing up,
Vancouver ascertained it to be a close sound, thus solving a second
of the problems of this hyperborean region, and finally proving the
non-existence of any passage but Behring Straits from the Pacific to
the Arctic Oceans. Cook’s River, henceforth known to be an inlet only,
though it retains its first misleading title in many modern atlases,
was the most northerly limit of this great voyage of discovery; and
the autumn of 1792 found Vancouver’s battered little fleet entering
the mouth of the Columbia River, which had been so named a few months
before, after his own vessel, by a certain Captain Gray of Boston, who
has been erroneously supposed to have been the first to discover it.
A thorough examination of this fine harbor, the only one of real
importance between that of San Francisco on the south and Port
Discovery on the north, completed Vancouver’s explorations on this
last trip to the West. He returned to England before the winter set
in; and though his account of his work was received with much hostile
criticism, every point laid down by him has been verified by later
travelers.
The important work done by Behring, Cook, Meares, and Vancouver
was greatly supplemented by minor heroes of various nationalities,
including Robert Gray of Boston; the Spaniards, Etevan Martinez and
Gonzalo Haro, sent from Mexico to look after the interests of their
Government in the North-west, who explored Prince William Sound;
Joseph Billings, from England, who touched at the Aleutian Islands;
and numerous French, English, and Russian captains. Their accounts
of their explorations were not, however, in any sense original
revelations, and we pass from them to the men who took up the work of
the early French _coureurs de bois_ and missionaries, pushing their
surveys westward from Hudson’s Bay, until they spanned the hitherto
unknown gulf between the last inland outposts of their predecessors
and the Pacific seaboard.
It was the failure of Baffin, Davis, and other early heroes of
Arctic discovery to find the clew to the long-coveted secret of the
vast labyrinth of straits, inlets, etc., between Greenland and the
north-eastern shores of America, which first directed the attention
of the thinkers of Europe to Hudson’s Bay as a possible passage to the
Pacific. As in Canada and elsewhere in America, however, scientific
exploration, for its own sake, soon retired before the pioneers
of commerce and settlement, making it next to impossible for the
geographical student to trace the thin line of discovery with any
certainty.
Strictly speaking, the work of the travelers who paved the way for
the foundation of the great Hudson’s Bay Company, destined to be so
formidable a rival to the French _coureurs de bois_, belongs to Arctic
history; but, in the early days of which we are now writing, those
whose main object was the discovery of the North-west Passage, often
turned aside from it either from necessity or curiosity, and in the
parentheses, so to speak, of their voyages, penetrated below the 60th
parallel, which we have taken as our most northerly limit. Notably
was this the case with the bold mariner, Luke Fox, of London, who,
in 1630, obtained from Charles I. the command of a pinnace of eighty
tons, manned by twenty men, with permission to cruise about Hudson’s
Bay until he found a northern passage out of it.
Fox’s pinnace entered Hudson’s Straits early in June, 1631, and,
eagerly steering his way among the numerous obstacles with which
they are always encumbered, he entered the bay itself in safety,
sailed across it in a north-westerly direction, and reached the
narrow passage known as the Welcome between its eastern shores and
Southampton Island. Here, for some unknown reason, he turned southward,
and, after an exciting cruise along the coasts of the great bay, he
came to the mouth of its greatest feeder, the Nelson, in N. lat. 56°
35′. Convinced that no passage to the northern ocean was to be found
so far south, and ignorant how near he had been to it when he changed
his course at the outlet of the Welcome, he now struck across the
bay in a north-westerly direction, till he came to the most southerly
point of Southampton Island, called Carey’s Swan’s Nest.
So much time had been wasted in the détour southward, which has
won for Fox a mention in our present volume, that he could now only
advance a short distance along the channel bearing his name, between
the east of Southampton Island and the western boundaries of the bay.
Compelled to return to England without having accomplished much, he
learned a little later, somewhat to his disgust, that his discoveries
in the south of the bay had been continued by his rival, Captain James.
James had met him at the mouth of the Welcome, in a little vessel
fitted out by the merchants of Bristol, with the same end in view as
Fox had――the finding of a passage to the East by way of Hudson’s Bay.
James, told by Fox that he was quite sure not to succeed in his quest,
had been driven, after this far from cheering meeting, to steer for
the south in consequence of his inability to cope with the huge masses
of ice which were now beginning to fill the northern half of the bay,
and arriving at what is now known as Charlton’s Island, in N. lat.
52° 5′, W. long. 80° 15′, he determined to winter there.
Terrible sufferings were now endured, but through them all James and
his men kept up their courage, preparing, in face of every difficulty,
for starting on the return voyage early in the following year. The
battered vessel was refitted; the southern shores alike of the island
and of the bay, were carefully examined; and when home was at last
reached by the survivors of the party, the reports given by them,
though not exactly encouraging to the general public, were such as to
embolden a few enterprising spirits to see what could be done in the
same direction.
A few years after the return of James to England, a Frenchman named
Grosseliez made a journey of discovery from Canada, and, after a
successful cruise up the western shores of Hudson’s Bay, landed in
Nelson’s River. Here, to his intense astonishment, he found a little
settlement of white men, who had made their way thither from Boston,
and were struggling, in spite of the rigorous climate, scarcity
of food, etc., to gain a permanent footing in the country. Leaving
these unexpected rivals to fight out their battles as best they could,
Grosseliez completed his own survey of the surrounding districts,
and hastened with it to France, hoping to gain the patronage of
the French monarch for an emigration scheme of his own. He entirely
failed in this purpose, but his pertinacity won for him the notice
of Mr. Montague, at that time English ambassador at Paris, who gave
him a letter of recommendation to Prince Rupert, then, after many
vicissitudes, in the very zenith of his prosperity.
Though at this time engaged in the eager prosecution of the
newly-discovered art of mezzotint engraving, which owed so much of its
perfection to him, Prince Rupert at once turned his attention to the
geographical problem laid before him by Grosseliez. The desirability
of securing to England the monopoly of the fur-trade of the North,
with the possibility of winning a new water highway to the North
through the as yet unexplored ice-blocked channels of the Great Bay,
or to the Pacific through some inland passage still to be discovered,
was recognized at once. Prince Rupert obtained the consent of his
cousin, Charles II., to the sending out of a pioneering expedition
under Captains Zachariah Gillam and Grosseliez; and in the summer of
1668, their little vessel entered Hudson’s Straits.
This time the eastern shores of the bay were explored, and a little
river flowing into the south-eastern extremity from Lake Mistassinie
was discovered, to which the name of Rupert was at once given. A fort
was erected at its mouth, and the adventurers returned home with a
report that lands rich in furs stretched away as far as the eye could
reach, on the east as well as on the west of Hudson’s Bay.
Encouraged by the result of this preliminary experiment, Prince
Rupert now obtained from Charles a charter, conferring on himself
and nine associates absolute proprietorship, subordinate sovereignty,
and exclusive traffic in a territory of undefined extent, embracing,
however, all the regions discovered or to be discovered within
Hudson’s Straits, and all lands from which rivers flowed into Hudson’s
Bay, saving only such as were already in the possession of any
Christian State or prince.
Now, as we know, the French, who claimed all lands from Canada to the
Pacific seaboard on the west, and to the Arctic circle on the north,
had already penetrated to the shores of Hudson’s Bay, and up the
Saskatchewan to the Rocky Mountains. From the first, therefore, the
new corporation, known as the Hudson’s Bay Company, found itself face
to face with a formidable rival, and, to the great disappointment of
its founders, the men who were sent out to develop the resources of
the newly-obtained territories showed themselves altogether unworthy
of the trust reposed in them. A brisk trade was carried on with the
Canadians in the ordinary necessaries of life, but there was a total
absence alike of mercantile enterprise and geographical zeal.
Not until 1721, some years after the claims of France to Canada had
been finally abandoned, in fulfillment of the conditions of the Treaty
of Utrecht, was any real effort at exploration made. At that date,
however, a certain John Knight, governor of one of the forts of the
Company, heard from some natives of a rich copper-mine in the north,
and begged his superiors to fit out an expedition, with him as its
leader, for the discovery alike of the mine and the Straits of Anian.
It was now the turn of the Company itself to show lukewarmness in the
good cause. Prince Rupert, who had been the very mainspring of the
corporation, had long been dead; his successors did not care to risk
their capital in any scheme of which the success was not fully secured.
“But,” urged Knight, “the charter by virtue of which you exist made
the search for a north-west passage, and one to the Pacific from the
East, absolutely compulsory; if you decline to allow me to make such
search, I will appeal to the King, who will doubtless withdraw his
letters patent if you neglect their conditions.”
Unable to shake the position taken up by their importunate servant,
the Hudson’s Bay Company at last roused itself from its lethargy, and
fitted out two vessels, which they placed under the naval direction of
Captains Barlow and Vaughan, who were, however, to consult Knight as
to their route.
Full of eager delight at this, as he thought, complete realization
of his hopes, poor Knight started on his voyage; but of that voyage
no record has ever been obtained. A year passed by, and there came
no message to his employers; two years, and still not a word from
him. Search expeditions were now sent out, but they were either
unskillfully or negligently conducted, and not until forty long years
had gone by was the sad truth revealed.
In 1767, two whaling vessels, cruising about the now well-known
passage of the Welcome, came to the entrance of a harbor never before
noticed, and, entering it, their captains and crews were astonished to
find its shores strewn with guns, anchors, and other European relics.
When they landed to examine this phenomenon, further evidence of the
place having been the scene of a great catastrophe was found in the
ruins of a house, and a little later in the discovery of the remains
of ships under water. There could be little doubt now that Knight
and all the members of his expedition had met their death at the very
commencement of their journey; and, two years later, the explorer
Hearne met some natives near the Welcome, who told him how, long
years before, some white men like himself had come in two ships, and,
landing, put together a wonderful house, the pieces of which they had
brought with them. These white men, added the Esquimaux, soon became
sick, and though they went on working all the same, most of them died.
In the winter, the survivors were glad to buy train-oil, blubber, and
seal-flesh, as all their own provisions failed them; and some of them,
who had been a long time without food, died of eating too greedily of
the strange diet supplied to them. In the following spring, but five
remained alive, and these died one by one, the last survivor falling
over the last but one in a vain attempt to dig his grave.
As may be supposed, the news of this awful catastrophe, of which
the worst horrors were probably even then unknown, did not encourage
further efforts on the desolate northern shores of Hudson’s Bay.
Before the sad fate of Knight and his comrades was discovered,
however, several attempts were made at the navigation of the various
rivers flowing from the west into the vast inland sea, with a view
to ascertaining if any of them led to the Pacific Ocean. In 1737, a
Captain Middleton entered the mouth of Churchill River (N. lat. 56°,
W. long. 30°), spent the winter on its shores, and in the ensuing
spring sailed through the Welcome, up the Wager Sound, opening on to
it on the west, and thence by way of the northern inlet of the Welcome,
into Fox’s Channel, thus completing the circuit of the bay all but
accomplished by his predecessors, Fox and James.
Convinced that no passage from Hudson’s Bay existed on the west,
Middleton returned to England to announce that conviction, but all
his assertions were met with scorn; and, a few years later, yet
another fleet, this time under the command of Captains Moore and Smith,
started in the vain quest. Hudson’s Straits were entered in July, 1746,
and the northern half of the bay being found impassable from ice, it
was resolved to winter at the mouth of Nelson’s River (N. lat. 56° 35′,
W. long. 95°), and start on the exploring expedition early in the
ensuing year.
Illustration: SLEDGE-DRIVING.
This programme was carried out, and in spite of the intense cold,
the party escaped many of the horrors usually attendant upon it to
Europeans, by following the advice of some friendly Esquimaux, who
gave them many hints as to the best way to avoid them. The summer
of the following year found the expedition moving up the bay, and a
thorough examination of the Wager Sound, proving it to be a close one,
was made; but, alas! this was the only result of what had appeared
likely to be one of the most successful expeditions yet fitted out.
Having discovered that no passage to the Pacific was to be found by
way of the Nelson or the Wager, Moore and Smith came to the conclusion
that no passage existed at all, and returned to England to announce
that their work was done. That they were received with what we may
really call a yell of execration is a matter of little surprise, but
that expression of public scorn was followed by no renewed attempt in
the same direction.
Knight, as we know, had disappeared, and the secret of his fate,
anticipated by us, was still unknown. Middleton, Moore, and Smith had
accomplished nothing. Surely it was time to make a change of tactics,
and with some such feeling the heads of the Company resolved to give
up the question of a water passage to the West for a time, and see
what could be accomplished by land. Not until 1769, however, two years
after the discovery of the relics of Knight’s expedition, was any
thing definite attempted, and by that date the Hudson’s Bay Company
had been to some degree supplanted by that known as the North-west,
which consisted of a number of British merchants who, without charter,
privileges, or public support, had been quietly, though energetically,
making good their footing in the great North-west.
Our readers will remember all that we have told them of the French
_coureurs des bois_, and of their rapid advance westward, accompanied
by the Jesuit missionaries, who did so much to check their abuses.
This advance at one time seemed likely to prevent that of any other
Europeans; but the cession of Canada to England in 1763, a cession
fraught with political consequences of such vital importance to the
whole civilized world, shook the power of the French to its foundation.
A royal proclamation was issued, organizing Canada under English
laws; and no longer could the lawless proceedings of the _coureurs
des bois_ be tolerated. Henceforth the lakes and rivers would miss
the skin-laden canoes of the half-savage traders; no more should the
remote forests echo with their shouts of joy as they brought down
their prey, or the solemn wastes of snow-clad plains be desecrated by
their wild revels.
The change――as all great changes generally are――was gradual. The
pioneers of the new order of things often surprised some little group
of dusky half-caste children, with eager eyes and vivacious ways
of their French fathers contrasting strangely with the shrinking
timidity inherited from their savage mothers. Now and then, too,
bloody struggles took place between the hunters of the rival nations;
and the natives, delighted to see the white men devouring each other,
began those treacherous assaults, in which they have ever proved
themselves adepts, which culminated in the massacres of Detroit and
Michilimackinac.
This terrible transition stage, where such numerous rivals were
contending for the monopoly of the fur-trade of the great North-west,
produced, as transition stages so often do, many a bold spirit eager
to win honor by facing the exceptional difficulties of the time. First
one and then another hero came forward to offer his services to the
Hudson’s Bay Company for new expeditions; first one and then another
member of its infant rival accomplished some traveling-feat hitherto
looked upon as impossible. Some few among these, such as Hearne of the
Hudson’s Bay Company, and Mackenzie of the North-west Company, worked
below as well as above the 60th parallel of north latitude, and must
therefore be noticed here.
Illustration: AN ESQUIMAUX DWELLING.
Hearne, the first of this brilliant pair of adventurers to start, left
the western shores of Hudson’s Bay in November, 1769, and accompanied
by two Europeans and a number of Indian guides, struck across country
in a northerly direction, with the head-waters of the Coppermine River,
so named after the mine supposed to exist in its vicinity, as his goal.
Again and again compelled to retrace his steps to the advanced forts
of his employers, on account of the scarcity of provisions and the
extreme cold, our hero did not enter the great northern plain until
December, 1770. Across it he was now, however, conducted in safety by
an Indian guide, named Matonnabbe, who was accompanied by his eight
squaws, on whom the chief burden of providing for the comfort of the
party was thrown.
So well did these poor women fulfill their mission, turning to account
every scrap of food which came in their way, that Hearne reached in
safety the most southerly of the great hyperborean series of frozen
lakes. Naming the smaller ones Cossed, Snow-bird, Pike, Peshew, and
Cagead, he came in due course to the more important Athabasca, just
below the boundary line of the 60th parallel of north latitude, and
beyond that again to the Great Slave Lake, situated between N. lat.
60° and 63° and surrounded on every side by rugged wooded heights,
presenting a pleasing contrast to the white stretches of snow and ice
extending on every side beyond.
These heights, which at first appeared inaccessible, were yet
traversed by a rough and winding path used by the Indians in their
wild hunting expeditions, and, following his dusky guides, Hearne
succeeded in scaling them and gaining the plain beyond. Another march
of short duration brought him to the source of the Coppermine River,
which rises near the Great Bear Lake, a tributary of the Mackenzie,
the discovery of which was reserved to Hearne’s rival and successor,
whose name it bears.
Instead of the wide river navigable for large vessels in the summer,
and with mines hiding vast stores of mineral wealth within easy
reach, Hearne found the Coppermine to be an unimportant stream flowing
through a barren and desolate country. Disappointed and disgusted,
he yet resolved to follow it to its mouth, and was proceeding on
his journey with dogged resolution, when the monotony of the daily
struggle with the difficulties presented by nature was broken by
a struggle between his Indian guides and some Esquimaux, resulting
in the massacre of the latter. In vain did our hero plead for mercy
for the inoffensive dwellers on the coast. The inland races of North
America entertain for their Arctic neighbors a hatred and contempt
which must be witnessed to be realized; and face to face with
Esquimaux, all private quarrels are merged in an eager desire for the
blood of the common enemy.
Disgusted at having burdened himself with companions who of course
rendered impossible any attempt at studying the ways of the new type
of human nature with which he was now brought in contact, Hearne
pursued his way northward, and before the close of the summer he was
rewarded for his perseverance by reaching the mouth of the Coppermine
River, and standing on the shores of the Arctic Ocean. For the first
time the eyes of a European rested upon that portion of the universal
sea surrounding the North Pole which washes the northern coast of
America; for the first time the white man realized the existence
of yet another ocean――an ocean which must henceforth replace the
fabulous unbroken masses of land figuring on all maps between the
most northerly limit reached by explorers and the North Pole.
Illustration: IN THE ARCTIC SEAS.
Before this great and unexpected revelation, throwing a flood of new
light on the geography of North America, and with it of the whole
world, all minor details sank into insignificance. Hearne had proved
beyond a doubt that the Strait of Anian, if such a strait there were,
had its eastern outlet, if any, in the Icy Sea; he had ascertained
that the American continent stretched away hundreds of miles beyond
what had hitherto been accepted as its western limits; he had seen
that the extreme North was inhabited by a race differing essentially
from all their southern neighbors; he had noticed the trace of the
existence of thousands of whales, seals, and other valuable denizens
of the deep; but what was all this, in Hearne’s estimation, compared
to the unvarnished fact of the existence of a new ocean!
Hastening back to Hudson’s Bay with the great news, Hearne saw the
copper-mine of which Indian tradition had told so much. It was a poor,
exhausted mine, not likely to yield the smallest profit to the Company;
but what of that? The Arctic Ocean lay beyond it! Following a somewhat
more westerly course than on his northern journey, Hearne entered
level districts abounding in game; but what of that? The Arctic Ocean
washed the desolate shores above the fur-yielding plains! A fair
young Indian woman, who had escaped from some Athapescow warriors
after the murder of her whole family, was found dwelling alone in a
little hut, supporting herself by hunting deer and snaring rabbits.
Hearne’s followers wrestled for the possession of the young exile as
a wife, and she was carried off by the victor; but this strange and
significant scene could scarcely interest our hero now. The Arctic
Ocean was awaiting its explorers――alas! also its victims――and the
ways of the natives, who had so little valued the great fact of its
existence, were of small account.
Roused from its lethargy at last by the report brought home by its
gallant employé, the Hudson’s Bay Company now did all in its power to
encourage further research, and to its efforts were due the sending
forth of Franklin on his first great voyage, which ushered in a new
era of Arctic exploration.
Before either Franklin, of Arctic renown, or Mackenzie, second only
in fame as an inland explorer to Hearne, was ready to start, however,
much good work was done by private adventurers, especially by Finlay,
Currie, Frobisher, and Pond, who, between 1763 and 1778, penetrated
to the banks of the Saskatchewan and Churchill Rivers, and to the
shores of Athabasca Lake, making intimate acquaintance with the
Hare and other Indian tribes, and paving the way for the voyages
on the Mackenzie, Peace, and Slave Rivers, which were among the
most noteworthy feats of the new claimant for the possession of the
fur-yielding districts of the extreme North-west.
Alexander Mackenzie, the hero of these important trips, was bred a
clerk in the service of the North-west Company, and, before starting
on his voyage as a geographical explorer, properly so called, had
served a long apprenticeship at the advanced station of Fort Chipewyan,
on the Athapescow Lake, whence he made several overland excursions in
different directions.
On the 3d June, 1789, our hero embarked in a native canoe on the Slave
River, and following its course, then unimpeded by ice, in a northerly
direction, he arrived on the 9th of the same month at the Slave
Lake. Skirting along its shores in a westerly direction, he presently
discovered the important river bearing his name, which has since
been found to be identical with the Athabasca, rising in the Rocky
Mountains near Mount Brown, and also with the Slave, the combined
waters of the two streams flowing, after their junction, to the Arctic
Ocean in Mackenzie Bay, N. lat. 70°, W. long. 136°.
Anxious to trace the course of the Mackenzie, the explorer was about
to proceed along it in his canoe, when he was told by some wandering
Indians that certain death would be the result, for the bed of the
stream was haunted by huge monsters, who would devour all who came in
their way. Moreover, it would take many years to reach the salt water.
The white man had better return the way he came. In any case, he could
hope for no help from the redskins.
Though these terrible prophecies did not affect Mackenzie himself,
they paralyzed his guides, who declared they would go no further;
and after trying alike persuasion and force, the Europeans determined
to do the best they could alone. They appear to have penetrated as
far north as the Great Bear Lake, but here, for some reason of which
we find no explanation in Mackenzie’s journal, the canoe was turned
southward, and the voyage back to the Slave Lake resumed. “My people,”
says Mackenzie, “could not refrain from some expressions of real
concern that they were obliged to return without reaching the sea;”
but he apparently made no great effort to gratify them.
Back again to Fort Chipewyan, Mackenzie lost no time in preparing
for a second journey of discovery. Embarking on the Peace River,
a tributary of the Slave or Athabasca, he followed its course in a
south-westerly direction, till he reached the first spurs of the
snow-clad Rocky Mountains, whence issued the river under examination.
Here the canoe was, of necessity, abandoned, and an arduous climb
began, resulting, however, in the successful scaling of the rugged
ridge, and the safe arrival at a village on its western side, where
the weary travelers were regaled with salmon, a fish never before met
with on their travels in North America.
Illustration: MACKENZIE’S FIRST VIEW OF THE PACIFIC OCEAN.
The inhabitants of this remote home in the wilderness were of a far
more civilized appearance than the Indians of the East; and as the
sea was approached by the explorers, they passed through settlements
numbering hundreds of well-built houses, peopled by various tribes
belonging to the southern branches of the great hyperborean group.
Members of the Sicannis and other Rocky Mountain families were met
with, who, one and all, showed courtesy to the white strangers, though
they were jealous of any interference with their fishing or hunting;
and as the western coast was approached, the active and intelligent
Thinkleets, chiefly of the Stikeen and Tungass tribes, excited the
admiration of their visitors by their ingenuity in the construction of
domestic and other implements, and their skill in painting and carving.
The shores of the North Pacific Ocean were finally reached in north
latitude 52° 20′ 48″. The whole of the continent of British America
had for the first time been traversed; its vast breadth had been
proved beyond a doubt; and the connecting link between the discoveries
on the western coast and those from the East, whether from Hudson’s
Bay, New England, or the Southern States, was added at last. Yet in
Mackenzie’s account of his work he scarcely notes the first sight
of the sea; we have searched in vain for any details of his sojourn
on its shores. Having done what he came to do, he turned back, and
retraced his steps, winding up the ♦narrative of his adventures with
this simple and unostentatious sentence:――“After an absence of eleven
months I arrived at Fort Chipewyan, where I remained for the purposes
of trade during the succeeding winter.”
♦ ‘narative’ replaced with ‘narrative’