Accordingly, he set out from Fort Prince of Wales, on Churchill River, in latitude 58° 50', on the 7th of December, 1770; and the whole of his proceedings, from time to time, are faithfully preserved in his journal. The publication of this is an acceptable present to the world, as it draws a plain artless picture of the savage modes of life, the scanty means of subsistence, and indeed of the singular wretchedness, in every respect, of the various tribes, who, without fixed habitations, pass their miserable lives, roving throughout the dreary deserts, and over the frozen lakes of the immense tract of continent through which Mr Hearne passed, and which he may be said to have added to the geography of the globe. His general course was to the northwest. In the month of June 1771, being then at a place called _Conge catha wha Chaga_, he had, to use his own words, two good observations, both by meridian and double altitudes, the mean of which determines this place to be in latitude 66° 46' N., and, by account, in longitude 24° 2' W. of Churchill River. On the 13th of July (having left _Conge catha wha Chaga_ on the 3d, and travelling still to the west of north) he reached the Copper-mine River; and was not a little surprised to find it differ so much from the descriptions given of it by the natives at the fort; for, instead of being likely to be navigable for a ship, it is, at this part, scarcely navigable for an Indian canoe; three falls being in sight, at one view, and being choaked up with shoals and stony ridges.
Here Mr Hearne began his survey of the river. This he continued till he arrived at its mouth, near which his northern Indians massacred twenty-one Esquimaux, whom they surprised in their tents. We shall give Mr Hearne's account of his arrival at the sea, in his own words: "After the Indians had plundered the tents of the Esquimaux of all the copper, &c. they were then again ready to assist me in making an end to the survey; the sea then in sight from the N.W. by W. to the N.E., distant about eight miles. It was then about five in the morning of the 17th, when I again proceeded to survey the river to the mouth, still found, in every respect, no ways likely, or a possibility of being made navigable, being full of shoals and falls; and, at the entrance, the river emptying itself over a dry flat of the shore. For the tide was then out, and seemed, by the edges of the ice, to flow about twelve or fourteen feet, which will only reach a little within the river's mouth. That being the case, the water in the river had not the least brackish taste. But I am sure of its being the sea, or some part thereof, by the quantity of whale-bone and seal-skins the Esquimaux had at their tents; as also the number of seals which I saw upon the ice. The sea, at the river's mouth, was full of islands and shoals, as far as I could see, by the assistance of a pocket-telescope; and the ice was not yet broken up, only thawed away about three quarters of a mile from the snore, and a little way round the islands and shoals.