The tombs of the Indian villages on this western side of the Rocky Mountains were superior to anything that Fraser had ever seen amongst savages.  They were about fifteen feet long, and of the form of a chest of drawers.  Upon the boards and posts, beasts and birds were carved in a curious but crude manner, and pretty well proportioned.  Returning to the river, when the worst of the rapids were passed, they descended it rapidly, helped by a strong current, and at length entered a lake where they saw seals, which showed that they had got near to the Pacific Ocean.  They also beheld a round mountain, the now celebrated Mount Baker, which is visible from so much of the surrounding country of British Columbia and Vancouver Island.  The trees were splendid, junipers thirty feet in circumference in their trunks and two or three hundred feet high.  Mosquitoes, however, were in clouds.  Nearer to the coast the Indians often appeared in the distance like white men, for the very literal reason that they had covered their skins with white paint.  Their houses were built of cedar planks, and were six hundred and forty feet long by sixty feet broad, all under one roof, but of course separated into a great number of partitions for different families.  On the outside the boards (as Mackenzie had noticed) were carved with figures of men, beasts, and birds as large as life.  Simon Fraser, however, when he reached sea water, near the site of New Westminster, was greatly disappointed that any view of the main ocean should be obstructed by distant lands.  He had believed all along that he was tracing the far-famed Columbia River to its entrance into the Pacific Ocean; and now that, instead of this, he had discovered an entirely new river, henceforth to be called after him but without so long a course as the Columbia, his vanity was hurt.

The Amerindians of the sea coast, opposite Vancouver Island, showed hostility to Fraser’s party, as they had done farther north to Mackenzie.  The Canadian voyageurs got alarmed, and told Fraser’s assistant, John Stuart, that they had made up their minds to return by land across the Rocky Mountains.  Fraser and the other officers of the expedition joined in arguing with them and recalling them to their senses.  Finally each member of the party swore a solemn oath before Almighty God that they would sooner perish than forsake in distress any of the crew in the present voyage.  After this ceremony was over all hands dressed in their best apparel, and each took charge of his own bundle.  They therefore returned as much as possible by the Fraser River, and only took to the mountains when obliged by the rapids.  They had to pass many difficult rocks, defiles, precipices, in which there was a beaten path made by the natives, and made possible by means of scaffolds, bridges, and ladders, so peculiarly constructed that it required no small degree of necessity, dexterity, and courage in strangers to undertake them.  For instance, they had to ascend precipices by means