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WE had now spent several days
with this people, and had become acquainted with many of them. I had formed
friendships with a number, which, grown stronger with the years, have helped
me in my life-work ever so much. Now we must continue our journey. Father
told them they might look for him next year about the same time, and as a
pledge of this he was going to leave me with Mr. Woolsey in the meantime.
Quite a large number escorted
us for several miles on our way, and seemed reluctant to have us go. They
had provisioned us with the choicest dried meat and pemmican, and our horses
were rested and ready to go on.
Our course was now westward
up the Battle River, and then northward for Edmonton, or as the Indians term
it, the "Beaver Hill House."
As we journeyed we came near
the scene of our hunt a few days since. A number of big prairie wolves were
to be seen. They were glutting themselves on the offal and carcases left on
the field. They were fat and could not run fast, and one could kill them
with a club from his horse's back. I drove one up to our party, and Peter
and William and I amused ourselves by making him trot between us for quite a
distance; then we let him go, for wolf-skins in those days were not worth
packing any distance.
We went in by the "Bony
Knoll" and what is now known as the "Hay Lake Trail," camped twice, and
reached the Saskatchewan opposite the fort in the evening of the third day.
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