As we look at these enduring lobsticks, we recollect that Commander Pullen, with two boats from the _Plover_ in 1849, visited the depot and found the precious pemmican. We leave the Mackenzie proper for the present and enter the easternmost channel of its farthest north tributary, the Peel, and follow this considerable stream thirty-three miles to Fort Macpherson, the most northerly post of the Hudson's Bay Company.
Fort Macpherson has a striking site. To the east, spreads a rolling wooded plain of alluvial origin, containing thousands of lakes. The west aspect gives us an uninterrupted view of the wooded valley of the Peel, backed by a heathery slope with the northern Rockies on the far horizon. Due north, upstarts a peak of the Rockies known locally as Black Mountain--a dark barren spur two thousand feet in height. A winter trail from Macpherson to Arctic Red River cuts no fewer than thirty-three small lakes.
[Illustration: Constable Walker and Sergeant Fitzgerald in Eskimo Togs]
On the beach to meet us are Mounted Police and Eskimo from Herschel Island, Church of England missionaries, traders of the H.B. Co., and Loucheux Indians. But here, as at Arctic Red River, it is that Polar gentleman the Eskimo who claims our attention. Let Sergeant Fitzgerald, R.N.W.M.P., stationed at Herschel Island, speak for the Kogmollye and Nunatalmute Eskimo. In his departmental report this officer states, "I have found these natives honest all the time I have been at Herschel Island. I never heard of a case of stealing among them." He has been there five years. Up here on the Arctic the bare word of an Eskimo is accepted of all men. If he states to an H.B. Co. factor that he has an order from a whaling captain to get certain goods for himself, that unwritten order is honoured though it may date back two or even three years, whereas an order presented by a white man must be in writing and certified.
Why should I enter the lists and take up icy spear for my Eskimo fellow British subject? Because he is so very worth while. Because through the years the world has conspired to libel him. Because within a decade or two he will have passed utterly off the map. And because it is so very much pleasanter to write appreciations than epitaphs. This man wins you at once by his frank directness; his bearing is that of a fearless child. The Indian, like Ossian's hero, scorns to tell his name, and on occasion will dodge the camera, but the Eskimo likes to be photographed. Young and old, they press to our side like friendly boys and girls round a "chummy" teacher, volunteering information of age, sex, and previous condition, with all sorts of covetable bits of intimate family history. You love the Eskimo because he is kind to his dogs and gentle to little children. His entire willingness to take you on credit is contagious, trust begets trust even in walrus latitudes.