inter must surprise
him in these northern solitudes. But in spite of this he could not
bring himself to turn back. With his men he stipulated for seven days;
if the northern ocean were not found in that time he would turn south
again.

{83}

The expedition went forward. On July 10, they made a course of
thirty-two miles, the river sweeping with a strong current through a
low, flat country, a mountain range still visible in the west and
reaching out towards the north. At the spot where they pitched their
tents at night on the river bank they could see the traces of an
encampment of Eskimos. The sun shone brilliantly the whole night,
never descending below the horizon. Mackenzie sat up all night
observing its course in the sky. At a quarter to four in the morning,
the canoes were off again, the river winding and turning in its course
but heading for the north-west. Here and there on the banks they saw
traces of the Eskimos, the marks of camp fires, and the remains of
huts, made of drift-wood covered with grass and willows. This day the
canoes travelled fifty-four miles. The prospect about the travellers
was gloomy and dispiriting. The low banks of the river were now almost
treeless, except that here and there grew stunted willow, not more than
three feet in height. The weather was cloudy and raw, with gusts of
rain at intervals. The discontent of Mackenzie's companions grew
apace: the guide was evidently at the end of his knowledge; while the
violent rain, the biting cold {84} and the fear of an attack by hostile
savages kept the voyageurs in a continual state of apprehension. July
12 was marked by continued cold, and the canoes traversed a country so
bare and naked that scarcely a shrub could be seen. At one place the
land rose in high banks above the river, and was bright with short
grass and flowers, though all the lower shore was now thick with ice
and snow, and even in the warmer spots the soil was only thawed to a
depth of four inches. Here also were seen more Eskimo huts, with
fragments of sledges, a square stone kettle, and other utensils lying
about.

Mackenzie was now at the very delta of the great river, where it
discharges its waters, broken into numerous and intricate channels,
into the Arctic ocean. On Sunday, July 12, the party encamped on an
island that rose to a considerable eminence among the flat and dreary
waste of broken land and ice in which the travellers now found
themselves.