Stepping Westward | 29

the year; when they are again fitted out in the same manner
and come back the latter end of March, or the beginning
of April. The major part of the Chipewyans return to the
‘barren grounds’ and live during the summer with their
relations and friends in the enjoyment of that plenty which
is derived from numerous herds of deer.”

Fort Chipewyan was a general rendezvous for all Atha-
basca, ‘This post, which Mackenzie describes, and the newer
one built later, on the north side of the lake, where it now
stands, were remarkable in that for over a century and a
quarter they formed the distributing and receiving point for
the commerce of a territory of more than half a million
square miles.

David Harmon makes certain observations in his journal
under date of 21 September, 1808:

‘Ever since my arrival in this place, people from almost
every corner of this extensive department have been flocking
in, some of whom are from more than a thousand miles down
Mackenzie’s River, which is nearly north-west from this.
Others are from Great Slave Lake and Peace River.
Mr. Simon Frazer has just returned from the Pacific
Ocean. Mr. Frazer states that his party met with some
ill-treatment from the Indians who live along the sea-coast
but that they were hospitably received by those who reside
farther up the country.” }

It was from this point that Mackenzie was about to put
to the test those theories he had formed after a year’s associa-
tion with Pond. All the details of the proposed trip down north
were carefully gone over, even to the providing of money
to trafic with the Russians if they should be encountered.

1 Harmon, Daniel Williams, Journal of Voyages and Travel in the
Interior of North America. Toronto, 1904, p. 140.