NORTH: WEST CONTINENT OF AMERICA.
in the evening, at'the foot of an high hill, on the north fhore, which in
fome paits rofe perpendicular from the river. I immediately afcended it
accompanied by two men and fomé Indians, and in about an hour and
an half, with very hard walking, we gained the fummit, when I was very
much furprized to find it crowned by an encampment. The Indians in-
formed rhe, that it is the cuftom of the people who have no arms to
choofe thefe elevated {pots for the places of their refidence, as they can
render them inacceflible to their enemies, particularly the Knifteneaux,
of whom they are in continual dread. The profpeét from this height
was not fo extenfive as we expeéted, as it was terminated by a circular
range of hills, of the fame elevation as that on which we flood. The in-
tervals between the hills were covered with {mall lakes, which were inha-
bited by great numbers of {wans. We faw no trees but the pine and the

birch, which were {mall in fize and few in number.

We were obliged to fhorten our ftay here, from the fwarms of muf-
quitoes which attacked us on all fides, and were, indeed, the only in-
habitants of the place. We faw feveral encampments of the natives in
the courfe of the day, but none of them were of this year’s eftablifh-
ment. Since four in the afternoon the current had been fo ftrong that it
was, at length, in an a€tual ebullition, and produced an hiffing noife like
a kettle of water in a moderate ftate of boiling. The weather was now
become extremely cold, which was the more fenfibly felt, as it had been

very fultry fome time before and fince we had been in the river.

. At five in the morning the wind and weather having undergone no
alteration from yefterday, we proceeded North-Weit by Weft twenty-two

miles,

Saturday,