the afternoon the swell was so
high, and the wind, which was against them, so boisterous, that they
could not proceed along the seacoast in their leaky canoe. A young
chief who had come with them as one of their guides, and who had been
allowed to leave when the seacoast was reached, returned bearing a
large porcupine on his back. He first cut the animal open and threw
its entrails into the sea, then singed the skin and boiled it in
separate pieces; nor did he go to rest till, with the assistance of
two others who happened to be awake, every morsel of it had been
devoured. This was fortunate, because their stock of provisions was
reduced to twenty pounds' weight of pemmican, sixteen pounds of rice,
and six pounds of flour amongst ten men, "in a leaky vessel, and on a
barbarous coast".

[Footnote 13: These _may_ have been small seals, but the sea otter
(_Enhydris lutris_), now nearly extinct, was at one time found in
numbers along the north-west American coast, from the Aleutian Islands
and Alaska to Oregon. Owing to persecution it now leads an almost
entirely aquatic life, resting at times on the masses of floating
seaweed.]

The rise and fall of the tide here was noted at fifteen feet in
height. Mr. Mackay collected a quantity of small mussels, which were
boiled and eaten by the two Scotchmen, but not by the Canadians, who
were quite unacquainted with sea shellfish.

Near Point Menzies, which had already been reached and named by
Captain VANCOUVER in the spring of 1793 on his great voyage of
discovery up the North American coast,[14] Alexander Mackenzie met a
party of Amerindians, amongst whom was a man of insolent aspect, who,
by means of signs and exclamations, made him understand that he and
his friends had been fired at by a white man named Makuba (Vancouver),
and that another white man, called "Bensins", had struck him on the
back with the flat of his sword. This man more or less compelled
Mackenzie to accompany him in the direction of his village, and on the
way explained that "Makuba" had come there with his "big boat".
Indeed, Mackenzie's party perceived the remains of sheds or buildings
on the shore where Europeans had probably made a camp, and here they
established themselves, taking up a position of defence, because the
attitude of the natives was rather threatening.

[Footnote 14: GEORGE VANCOUVER (born about 1758, and probably
descended from Dutch or Flemish ancestors) was one of the great
pioneers o