re rer mere i eee Taine Spc es itnaaiee eee at ~eauene fee 8 Rs A Be o> Sepeerper eau a ee -—#{ TO CARIBOO AND BACK }-- believe it. It was hard, too, to believe that the tiny stream they saw could be the mighty river they had heard so much about. Yet so said such Indians as they met on their way, and they had no one but the Indians to rely on for directions. A final halt was called for repairs to out- fit and for replenishing their stores, for the last bag of pemmican had been opened and little else remained. Here those remaining of the long caravan that had come all the way from Fort Garry gathered together again to consider their future way. Here they finally separated into two companies, one choosing the Fraser route and the other striking south, overland, to find the headwaters of the Thompson. They hoped to reach Kamloops and from there sail downstream till they struck the Fraser and the mining camps along its banks. But forty or more of the travellers, and among them the group of friends we know best, chose to take the more adventurous route and to run the rapids and the cascades of the Fraser first north to Fort George, and then south to Quesnel and the Cariboo. It was a dangerous undertaking. The Indians shook their heads over it; they had not much faith in these white [126]