In the immediate neighbourhood of Fort Pitt two camps of Crees established themselves, at first in the hope of obtaining medical assistance, and failing in that—­for the officer in charge soon exhausted his slender store—­they appear to have endeavoured to convey the infection into the fort, in the belief that by doing so they would cease to suffer from it themselves.  The dead bodies were left unburied close to the stockades, and frequently Indians in the worst stage of the disease might be seen trying to force an entrance into the houses, or rubbing portions of the infections matter from their persons against the door-handles and window-frames of the dwellings.  It is singular that only three persons within the fort should have been infected with the disease, and I can only attribute the comparative immunity enjoyed by the residents at that post to the fact that Mr. John Sinclair had taken the precaution early in the summer to vaccinate all the persons residing there, having obtained the vaccine matter from a Salteaux Indian who had been vaccinated at the Mission of Prince Albert, presided over by Rev. Mr. Nesbit, sometime during the spring.  In this matter of vaccination a very important difference appears to have existed between the Upper and Lower Saskatchewan.  At the settlement of St. Albert, near Edmonton, the opinion prevails that vaccination was of little or no avail to check-the spread of the disease, while, on the contrary, residents on the lower portion of the Saskatchewan assert that they cannot trace a single case in which death had ensued after vaccination had been properly performed.  I attribute this difference of opinion on the benefits resulting from vaccination to the fact that the vaccine matter used at St. Albert and Edimonton was of a spurious description, having been brought from Fort Benton, on the Missouri River, by traders during the early summer, and that also it was used when the disease had reached its height, while, on the other hand, the vaccination carried on from Mr. Nesbit’s Mission appears to have been commenced early in the spring, and also to have been of a genuine description.

At the Mission of St. Albert, called also “Big Lake,” the disease assumed a most malignant form; the infection appears to have been introduced into the settlement from two different sources almost at the same period.  The summer hunting-party met the Blackfeet on the plains and visited the Indian camp (then infected with small-pox) for the purpose of making peace and trading.  A few days later the disease appeared among them and swept off half their number in a very short space of time.  To such a degree of helplessness were they reduced that when the prairie fires broke out in the neighbourhood of their camp they were unable to do any thing towards arresting its progress or saving their property.  The fire swept through the camp, destroying a number of horses, carts, and tents, and the unfortunate people returned to their homes at Big Lake carrying the disease