Mr. Smith, a partner of the North-West Company, arrived from the Great Slave Lake bearing the welcome news that the principal chief of the Copper Indians had received the communication of our arrival with joy and given all the intelligence he possessed respecting the route to the sea-coast by the Copper-Mine River; and that he and a party of his men, at the instance of Mr. Wentzel, a clerk of the North-West Company whom they wished might go along with them, had engaged to accompany the Expedition as guides and hunters.  They were to wait our arrival at Fort Providence on the north side of the Slave Lake.  Their information coincided with that given by Beaulieu.  They had no doubt of our being able to obtain the means of subsistence in travelling to the coast.  This agreeable intelligence had a happy effect upon the Canadian voyagers, many of their fears being removed:  several of them seemed now disposed to volunteer; and indeed on the same evening two men from the North-West Company offered themselves and were accepted.

June 5.

This day Mr. Back and I went over to Fort Wedderburne to see Mr. Robertson respecting his quota of men.  We learned from him that, notwithstanding his endeavours to persuade them, his most experienced voyagers still declined engaging without very exorbitant wages.  After some hesitation however six men engaged with us who were represented to be active and steady; and I also got Mr. Robertson’s permission for St. Germain, an interpreter belonging to this Company, to accompany us from Slave Lake if he should choose.  The bowmen and steersmen were to receive one thousand six hundred livres Halifax per annum, and the middle men one thousand two hundred, exclusive of their necessary equipments; and they stipulated that their wages should be continued until their arrival in Montreal or their rejoining the service of their present employers.

I delivered to Mr. Robertson an official request that the stores we had left at York Factory and the Rock Depot with some other supplies might be forwarded to Slave Lake by the first brigade of canoes which should come in.  He also took charge of my letters addressed to the Admiralty.  Five men were afterwards engaged from the North-West Company for the same wages and under the same stipulations as the others, besides an interpreter for the Copper Indians; but this man required three thousand livres Halifax currency which we were obliged to give him as his services were indispensable.

The extreme scarcity of provision at the posts rendered it necessary to despatch all our men to the Mammawee Lake where they might procure their own subsistence by fishing.  The women and children resident at the fort were also sent away for the same purpose; and no other families were permitted to remain at the houses after the departure of the canoes than those belonging to the men who were required to carry on the daily duty.