When illustrating a position I had advanced, by the ascension of the smoke from my pipe, we both turned up our eyes to witness its progress upwards:  on looking towards the aperture in the roof what was our astonishment at beholding the faces of two Indians, calmly surveying us in the quiet occupation of their abode.  In an instant we shouted—­“The Indians!” and in a moment every one was on the alert, and each taking his arms rushed to the door—­not a creature was to be seen; in vain we looked around;—­no trace, save the marks of footsteps on the snow, was to be discovered, but these seemed almost innumerable.  We fired about a dozen shots into the woods, and then retired to our dwelling. ——­ and I then resolved to take alternate watch, and every half hour, at least to walk round the house.  During the night, however, we were not again disturbed, save by the howling of wolves and barking of foxes. 
          
                                              E.S.

After the capture of Mary March, the next attempt, in order of time, to discover the Red Indians was made by JAMES CORMACK, Esq., in 1822, and for that purpose he crossed the whole interior of the Island—­starting from Random Bar on the Eastward on the 6th September, and finding his way out at St. George’s Bay, on the 2nd November following.  During this excursion he suffered great privation,—­which few men could have endured, and which few men indeed, would have undertaken with only one companion.  Mr. Cormack did not succeed in the main object he had in view, yet was his trouble anything but profitless.  We now possess through his means a general knowledge of the interior of our Island—­together with a specific account of its soil—­its geological and mineralogical aspect—­its varied natural productions—­of trees, shrubs, plants, flowers, &c., all named and methodically described—­the kind of animals met with, and a variety of other useful information.

In the following year, 1823, and early in the spring of that year, three females, a mother and two daughters, in Badger Bay, near Exploits Bay, being in a starving condition, allowed themselves in despair, to be quietly captured by some English furriers who accidentally came upon them.  Fortunately their miserable appearance, when within gunshot, led to the unusual circumstance of their not being fired at.  The husband of the elder woman in attempting to avoid the observation of the white men, tried to cross the creek upon the ice, fell through and was drowned.  About a month before this event, and a few miles distant from the spot where this accident occurred, the brother of this man and his daughter, belonging to the same party, were shot by two English furriers.  The man was first shot, and the woman in despair remained calmly to be fired at, and incredible as it may appear, this poor woman, far from her tribe—­helpless—­with her back to her murderers,—­excited in them no feeling of compassion—­they deliberately shot her,—­the slugs passed through her body, and she fell dead by the side of her father.  The mind is slow to believe that so brutal an act as this could have been committed, and is willing to doubt the correctness of the report, but the proof of its accuracy is the statement of one of the ruffians who perpetrated the foul act.