The treaty had been effected at Dunvegan, on the 6th, with a few Beaver Indians, who still lingered by their tepees, pitched to the west on the opposite shore.  The half-breeds had camped near the fort pending our arrival, and we found them a very intelligent people, indeed, with some interesting relics of the old regime still amongst them.  One, in particular, had canoed from Lachine with Simpson sixty years before.  He was still lively and active, and a patriarch of the half-breed community.  Large families we found to be the rule here, some parents boasting of twelve or thirteen children under age.  This, and their healthy looks, spoke well for the climate, and their condition otherwise was promising, being comfortably clad, all speaking more or less English or French, whilst many could read and write.

Our work being completed here, we set out for the Crossing by waggon, our route lying over the same majestic prairies, and reached the Landing the second night, passing the Roman Catholic and Church of England Missions on the way.  The former Mission is an extensive establishment, with a fine farm and garden.  Indeed, with the exception of primitive outlying stations, all the principal Roman Catholic Missions, by their extent and completeness, put our own more meagrely endowed establishments into rather painful contrast.

A great concourse of natives was at the Landing awaiting our arrival.  The place was covered with tepees and tents, and no less than four trading marquees had been pitched pending the scrip issue, which it took some time to complete.

Near the Landing were the mill and farm of a namesake of Sir Alexander Mackenzie.  His father, indeed, was a cousin of the renowned explorer who gave his name to the great river of the North.  This father, under whom, Mr. Mackenzie said, Lord Strathcona had spent his first year as a clerk in the Hudson’s Bay Company’s service, was drowned, with nine Iroquois, whilst running the Lachine Rapids in a bark canoe.  His son came to Peace River in 1863, and his career, as he told it to me, will bear repeating.  He was born at Three Rivers, in Lower Canada, in 1843, and was sent to Scotland to be educated, remaining there until he was eighteen years of age.  In 1861 he joined the Hudson’s Bay Company’s service, wintering first at Norway House under Chief factor William Sinclair, but removed to Peace River, became a chief-trader there in 1872, and, after some years of service, retired, and has lived at the Crossing ever since.

The Landing, he told me, used to be known as “The Forks,” it being here that the Smoky River joins the Peace; and here were concentrated, in bygone days, the posts and rivalries of the great fur companies.  The remains of the North-West Company’s fort are still visible on the north bank, a few miles above the Landing.  On the south shore, in the angle of the two rivers, stood the Hudson’s Bay Company’s fort, whilst the old X. Y. Company’s post, at that time the best equipped on the river, stood on the north bank opposite the Smoky.