Plan of the Journey : Early Stages : At Edmonton : A Peculiarity
of Northern Rivers.
The area drained by the Mackenzie River is of vast extent, covering
something over 450,000 square miles. Its principal tributaries flow
from the west; they consist of the Athabaska, the Peace, the Liard
and the Nahanni with many others of smaller size. To illustrate by
comparison the size of the Mackenzie basin with that of some other
streams, it is only necessary to say that the area of the St. Lawrence
basin above the City of Montreal is about 310,000 square miles, while
that of the Saskatchewan, including its two branches, is only 159,000
square miles; so that the Mackenzie basin exceeds that of the St.
Lawrence above Montreal, including that of all the great lakes by
140,000 square miles, and is nearly three times as great in extent as
the basin of the Saskatchewan, including both the north and south
branches of that great river.
A journey down that immense valley with my objective a point near the
Polar Sea was the last I had set myself to accomplish. I had also
hoped, but scarcely dared to expect to find my way back again to
civilisation by crossing the Rocky Mountains to streams, whose waters
find their way to the Yukon. Thence South up the latter stream to
Dawson and Whitehorse, thence over the White Pass Railway to Skagway
and from there to Vancouver. However, notwithstanding many misgivings,
this programme was literally carried out and that without encountering
a single accident worthy of mention. Knowing that my plans could be
best accomplished through the assistance of the Hudson Bay Company, I
applied to my friend Mr. Chipman, the late Commissioner from whom I had
previously received assistance on other trips in the North Country, and
was soon in possession of a letter to their agents, which had merely to
be presented to assure me all the hospitality that could be given, in a
country where hospitality means so much.
On the last day of May, 1906, I found myself at Edmonton busily
preparing for the journey. Edmonton, which but a few years ago was only
known as the _entrepôt_ of the Hudson Bay Company in the far West, is
now, as the Capital of Alberta, putting on the appearance and assuming
the airs of a modern City. Not only is it advancing commercially,
but socially and intellectually it is not satisfied to remain in the
background. With its semi-viceregal social establishment and its
Provincial University, it already claims no inferior place to the
Capitals of Sister Provinces. Edmonton’s resources are more varied and
her population more cosmopolitan than most of them. By her doors flows
one of the great rivers of America, with timber and coal along its
banks all the way to its source, while stretching away on every side is
the rich soil of that wonderfully fertile belt that is bringing riches
to tens of thousands of pioneer settlers. To all this it may be added
that this new northern City has tributary to it, the vast northern
region even down to the Arctic Sea, with little fear of any future
rival. In a word, Edmonton is destined to be at once the Moscow and
St. Petersburg of Canada.
Amid all the evidences of an active bustling life an incident occurred
during the few days I spent there, which cast a dark shadow across the
path of some of the older residents. During the early days, before the
present invasion of new-comers began, the scattered settlements of
half breeds and whites here and there over a large extent of country
formed a somewhat close community, among the members of which there
grew up a very warm attachment. This was further cemented by frequent
intermarriages, and it was truly pleasing to hear the eager inquiries,
from these people when we visited their homes beyond the Arctic Circle,
concerning their relatives at Edmonton and even Winnipeg.
It so happened that the wife of a Hudson Bay Official, well-known
throughout the country, had come down to Edmonton from Fort Simpson
on the Mackenzie by the last (and I might say, the only) boat of the
previous year, intending to return by the first transport in the
following one, (1906)--that on which I was also to travel. She had all
preparations made for her return trip and was about ready to start,
when a sudden illness intervened and she was called to make a journey
to a land even less known than the one we were to penetrate. There
was an old time funeral at Edmonton, and many were the expressions of
sympathy heard on the street for the husband twelve hundred miles away,
who, all unconscious of what had occurred, would be looking for his
wife when our boat reached Fort Simpson. We realised throughout the
long days of our journey to that point that we were carrying to the
widowed husband the saddest of all messages.
On a bright morning on June 2, in a comfortable conveyance and with a
good span of horses, we turned our faces to the North, bidding good-bye
to the Railway and various other adjuncts of modern civilised life, and
in less than three days arrived at Athabaska Landing, in round figures,
one hundred miles distant.
Little need be said concerning this first stage in my journey, though
the country passed over for some twenty miles would certainly be a
surprise to any one familiar only with the new settlement in the
wooded districts in the older Provinces. Certainly less than twenty
years ago, this district was an unsettled part of a great wilderness.
To-day, with its cultivated fields and with just enough woodland left
to vary the monotony that characterises the treeless plains, as we
looked across the country, really park like in appearance, we could
almost fancy that we were passing through some of the rural districts
of Old England. Early on the second day, we passed the height of
land between the basin of the Saskatchewan and that of the Mackenzie
River, though the land is so little elevated that it is imperceptible.
Notwithstanding this, the waters of two neighbouring rivulets within
almost a stone’s-throw of each other, finally find their outlet into
two different oceans. The one by way of the Saskatchewan, Lake Winnipeg
and the Nelson River to the Hudson Bay of the Atlantic, and the other
via the Athabaska, Slave and Mackenzie Rivers to the Arctic.
Athabaska Landing is on a southerly bend of the Athabaska River. This
stream was named the Elk River in Mackenzie’s time. At the “Landing”
it is about sixty rods wide and the water is of the consistency and
appearance of the Mississippi at St. Louis. Its general direction above
this point is easterly, but here it takes a sharp turn north, which
direction it maintains throughout its remaining course of 430 miles to
Lake Athabaska, the latter called “The Lake of the Hills” by Mackenzie.
At Edmonton nearly every person met with had been talking land and town
lots. The hotels were filled with “land lookers,” coming from various
parts of Canada with a large percentage of visitors from the United
States, most of them speaking the English language, varied in tone
in accordance with the districts from which they came. There was the
“blue nose” from the Maritime Provinces with a dialect not unlike that
heard in parts of England: the French Canadian speaking French English:
the man from Ontario, also with his distinctive mark branded on him,
though not realising it himself: the Western American from Dakota,
Montana, Idaho and Kansas, each also with his peculiar idioms, but all
self-assertive and reliant.
At Athabaska Landing all was changed. The conversation here was of none
of these things, but rather of last season’s hunt and the state of the
river; conveyed largely in the language of the Cree Indian. This is
certainly a border town consisting of two or three hundred inhabitants
largely half breeds. It is perhaps worthy of remark that no offence
is taken in applying the term “half breed” to one who by nationality
deserves the name, while he will bitterly resent the epithet “breed.”
A few years before I had made a journey from “The Landing” to Peace
River, going from the latter place up the Athabaska some eighty miles,
thence up a tributary, the Little Slave River into and across Lesser
Slave Lake, thence overland eighty miles to the Peace River. I crossed
near the entrance of Smokey River, where Sir Alexander Mackenzie had
spent the winter to which I have already made reference.
[Illustration:
_Copyright Ernest Brown_
TRACKING ON ATHABASKA RIVER]
During this journey I came to admire those half breed river men. It
is a peculiarity of most of those northern rivers that although the
current is very strong there are few interruptions to their navigation
with canoes, York boats or small barges. It is impossible to make
much headway however in going up stream by means of paddles or oars, so
“tracking” is resorted to. This consists of towing the boat by means
of a line, one end of which is attached to the bow of the craft while
to the other are usually harnessed four men, who walk or run along the
shore, often making three or four miles an hour. On one of the usual
river craft, the crew consists, at least, of ten men, four pulling
for about half an hour, while the other four are resting in the boat
during that time, then changing places. In addition to these there is
a bow man and a steersman, the latter being the Captain. From twenty
to twenty-five miles a day are frequently made in this manner. The
discipline and order are as good as on any ship of His Majesty’s navy.
The steersman’s orders are never interfered with, even if an official
of the “The Company” is on board. These men will undergo the most
fatiguing labour “from early dawn to dewy eve,” tugging away during
those long northern summer days over slippery cut banks and fording or
swimming tributary streams without murmur or complaint, and moreover
without profanity. The half breed seems to take this as his work to
do, and well it is that he is so persuaded, for few others would so
cheerfully perform such labour. His reward comes on the return trip
when the boat is simply left to drift down stream both night and day,
and the time of making a journey down is often less than one quarter of
that occupied by the up trip.
The land rises in terraces from the shore of the Athabaska to a height
of from one to four hundred feet. In some places where the river is
straight enough to give a vista of a mile or two, and where the fire
has been merciful enough to leave the hill sides clothed with spruce,
balsam, aspen and birch, with an occasional lobstick standing up as a
sentinel on the water’s edge, the scenery, if not strikingly beautiful,
is at least pleasing in effect. I might here mention that the lobstick
is always a curiosity to a new visitor. It will meet his view on his
arrival at Athabaska Landing, and along the banks of all the rivers of
the north, will be a familiar sight. It is a tree, usually a spruce,
from which the branches have been trimmed off from a point, commencing,
say ten feet from the top and extending down the trunk for eight
or ten feet. The tree chosen is generally a tall conspicuous one,
standing on a point on the shore, and on it near the ground certain
hieroglyphics are inscribed, which record the event for which the
lobstick was made.
In passing it may be observed that in my trip from Athabaska Landing to
Fort McPherson, a distance of 1854 miles, no part of it was up stream,
and consequently, the line was not used.