himself, as he explained to
Richardson, in the deserted fort with five companions, in a state of
utter destitution. Food there was none. {105} From the refuse heaps
of the winter before, now buried under the snow, they dug out pieces of
bone and a few deer-skins; on this, with a little _tripe de roche_,
they endeavoured to subsist. The log house was falling into decay.
The seams gaped and the piercing air entered on every side with the
thermometer twenty below zero. Franklin and his companions had tried
in vain to stop the chinks and to make a fire by tearing up the rough
boards of the floor. But their strength was insufficient. Already for
two weeks before their arrival at Fort Enterprise they had had no meat.
It was impossible that they could have existed long in the miserable
shelter of the deserted fort. Franklin had endeavoured to go on.
Leaving three of his companions, now too exhausted to walk far, he and
the other two, a Canadian and an Eskimo, set out to try to reach help
in the direction of Fort Providence. The snow was deep, and their
strength was so far gone that in six hours they only struggled four
miles on their way. At night they lay down beside one another in the
snow, huddled together for warmth, with a bitter wind blowing over
their emaciated bodies. The next morning, in recommencing their march,
Franklin stumbled and fell, breaking his snow-shoe in the {106} fall.
Realizing that he could never hope to traverse the one hundred and
eighty-six miles to Fort Providence, he directed his companions to go
on, and he himself made his way back to Fort Enterprise. There he had
remained for a fortnight until found by Richardson and Hepburn. So
weak had Franklin and his three companions become that they could not
find the strength to go on cutting down the log buildings of the fort
to make a fire. Adam, the Indian, lay prostrate in his bunk, his body
covered with hideous swellings. The two Canadians, Peltier and
Samandre, suffered such pain in their joints that they could scarcely
move a step. A herd of deer had appeared on the ice of the river near
by, but none of the men had strength to pursue them, nor could any one
of them, said Franklin, have found the strength to raise a gun and fire
it.

Such had been the position of things when Richardson and Hepburn,
themselves almost in the last stage of exhaustion, found their unhappy
comrades. Richardson was a man of striking energy, of the kind that