The Express.
London, England, 1865-01-05 00:00:00

4

AN BIPEDITION ACROSS Tl' BOCXT

KOWIrAZI3.
--•---

Oti Tuesday tiight • Whin, doectriptte Of ha
myelin moms the by Messiahs UMW British
Osiamhat by time Yeilsw Mead ar Imam Pam. ISOM*
plished by_Vioesaat Mimi F.R.G.S.. F.LB.L., r.A.81.,
mera in .W. B. Med* B.A. Y. 8., F.R.G.S., has de-
tho PhtiosaphimillaU, Leeds, before • large
rialkass. Both travellers were prelatic.
Dr. Chum.; who MCI the papa, staid that It woad
he in one 1101115 le give as mond of the whole
gtßlita sad be abooloshistdors. dwell FM= =
Os mat intorsetiag that which
We le the wilds of the 's By cousin, sad their
adnotnres in crone* the Rooky Minatolas Jab the Rah
ma's Bay wintry, into BMA thilmabia. thrand poems
Omagh thus 13101titaieS had already, is 1860, bee. die-
sovond by Carlon Palliser sad Dr. Hadar ; bat they lay
far south of We goldfields of Cariboo. sad wore
agar the American frontier. The Loather Priss,": i=raci
hassrly beta mid by the Hodsoo's Bay_ Comma, as •
from the Albania' River to the Fraser, had lam
laterCrladomad. ea scow% of the daningons shandsr of
the river. Lard Miltoa and Dr. Cheadle left Ear
had in the simmer of 1862, datitminad to nisch Otriboo
if pomade by the most direct rods, taking thin pre sad
exploring the hitherto unknown mien of the awth breath
of the Thomproa River. They arrived at Fort Gann, on
the Red River Sediment, oa the 7th of August, havollad
M Fort Cariboo, on the aorth breath of the Saskatchwart,
sad thea North about 70 milts to • plats called La Balls
Peeirtediey into winter
oa amount of the advanced period of the
built a log hat and weal in winter quarters.
C. seventy d the cold win soak that the largo
ins they kept up eoold not melt the mad used in
the soastructica of the but, sod even within a yard
tics blazing lugs the tea is their caps speedily
mimed with a and of los. Notwithstiadiag the many
jr severings they wore, the wore frimosotly severely frost-
Whoa. During this they had to be almost coastantly
ea the move, tra bathwards and forwards 80 or 100
amass through the mow to the plans, to kill
buffalo. The mist was ly mansurnsd by the help of
the starving lodians around them, sad occiatimally
sasht
ware driven to satisfy banger by sating =mom food
m meek-rats, martona, make, fishers, sad others. Whoa
the thaw sot in at the beginning of April, the Feat)
again started westward, along the northabranch of the
Baskatthowao, by Fort Pitt to Mendota. Of the country
extending from the Red River to the bast of the Rooky
Mountains, the lecturer spoke in she highest tams, awing
that it IS peculiarly well adapted for sottlommt, rich
prairies which are ready for the plough being( interspersed
with woods, which would famish timber for building sad
hada& The climate is the alimato of Canada ; the spring,
however, mating in a month earlier than it dose on the
dams of Lako Superior. Goals al all bads grows with the
stodast luxuriance, and the root crops are certainly tow
than them of England. The padmins is almost mailers ia
othat, and mosediagly marlahtag. Coal beds of lap sue
exist as the Seakatchewan, Battle, and Pembina mars
and clay-ironstone, large quantities, has been disoovarod.;
Yet this storms mostry estimated by Dr. Hector at
40,000,000 of acres of the richest soil—is, from its isolated
poitioa sad the obstructions pat is the way of wititinimat
by the governing power hitherto, heft utterly seglsotod and
.rims, except for tho salt: a few lodisas tad the
egyikyis el the Hudson's Company. Could coationalm
hos he established with and British Colombia,
this district would, the lecturer lmagiaed, brooms one of
the most valuable pathos of the British poseensicam At
Edmonton, Lord Milton's party made their Goal pre-
mistime., aa they could obtain no further supplies until
they had travelled 600 or 700 mild'. They bad hors addi-
tional inferential regards' a body of emigrants of whom
they had formerly heard, via, that they had divided into
two parties—ono portion descending by the Frame river on
ralta, sad the other striking souk for the Thompson river.
Another party followed at a Ltor period, intoa
to do-
omed the Fraser in camaa of the rods which Lord Mil-
itia proposed to take they heard the most mammal:de
accounts, but they aeverthshas ddorminad to sot oat. The
party consisted of Lord Elite., Dr. Cheadle. sad five *thin,
via., Baptiste Sepses**, a kalf-broad, whom they had essayed
m raids ; Louis Battoootts, commonly called .'TheAmami-
bona," with his wife awl son, ths latter a boy of thirteen ;
sad lastly, Mr. O'H---, an Irish gentleman of amidst,
able ctionical attainmacta, but of marvellous timidity sad
helplessness; throughout ths jouraoy unhappy daring the
day horn a (normal tow of losing his way, or being de-
mand by grisly bears ; nimble to sleep at ni•ht for fear
the horns should trample on him, or Indians or wild
boosts attack tho camp. Afraid to touch a horse and unable
to handle an axe, his solo employment consisted in be-
wailing the hardships of his position sod prophesying
riarevils for the future, comforting himself by
psrusal of Paley' s ' Evidences of Christianity,*
which he never failed to study diligently hires times a
day during theeighty-anon which the Joann lasted.
They lift Edmonton on the 3rd of Jane, sad after mom(
Lab St. Ann's, 39 miles bayo'. cum upon a track through
a dims foot, sufficient only for one horse, sad of such a
nature that the animals sank up to the hocks in bog, with-
eat the possibility of escape on either side. The character
el the country in this district has hose completely changed
through the Bracey of the beam, which formerly
misted there in enormous Bambara. The country was
one traversed by streams sod shams and lakes, which
won dammed up by them animals, and are sow merely a
Darin of marshes. At the McLeod river, which they reached
CO the lab of Juno, they wen deserted by their midi:
bat the Assiniboins, pcobobly on account of his wife and
shad, still rimansd latthlith In this part of the
jemmy they narrowly moved losing, by • fin in
the forth, their bones and property, if not their lives.
The hams had kicked some of the blazing logs of the 'amp
firs among the pine trees, and they were in a blaze. Dr.
Cheadle seized an ars, rushed to the place. and felled tree
after teen to hold* those already fired from the wt
whilst Lord Milton, with • moll bockst,fotthod sod poured
orator upon the thick dry moss, through which the firs was
rapidly spreading along the smith of the ground. They
were nearly surrounded by blazing treat, and the doom
famed and leaped up from branch to branch in the most
spoiling manner. Fortunately, however, the firs was
at Length got ender, though not through jot mortices of
Mr. O'B—. who brought • tardy and ineffectual assistance
to the quenching of the fire in the shope of half pints of
water iu his link tin mug. On the atoning of the 25th
they attack the Attabusoa River, and got a first sod glorioas
view of On Rocky Monamias. The trail was still ex-
tremely diflicalt—through dome forests sad pia, wimps.
Oa the 29th, however, it led them up the mountain aids to
• great height : and while almost in the clouds they bad
the satidaction of seeing Jasper House, which they
had for some days put been a:pectin to mech.
While in the Rocky Mountains, in the midst of
which they were now fairly travelling, they foetid
two specimens of the fibushwap tribe of Indian+.
ID* party next oroesed the Altrabasca by raft, then fol-
lowed the course of lb* Myrtle, and shortly altar struck the
Fawn Alma the volley of the latter she track was most
difficult, and in cm place ma 'topped by alone rock, which
they had with great labour to remove. At Tito Janna's
Cacho, which they reached on the 17th, two of the pack
hers.. strayed into the stream which there rushed along
with tremendous rapidity, and one of them was lost, the
other being rescued in the most intrepid manner by the
Aminibono. They lest, with the horse, all their spare
clothes, instruments. ;snore (extenti*utuali), Oink, tea,
salt, sad tobacco. They next wored the PrittOr river, and
struck booth. Is the passage of the Canoe river, they bad
another narrow imam The river was insingly
swollen, the correct very rapid, and the banks much
beset with fall's sod overhanging timber and drift-
wood. In poling away from some rocks and driftwood
on the side they started from they we swept
ethos in an instant to the opposite side of the river, and
carried straight for an enormous pine growing horizoattlly
oat of the bank, and closely overhanging the water, in
which the 'carer branches were submerged. As they neared
she bide, Dr. Cheadle and the Assiniboioe leaped ashore and
whipped the ropes attached to the raft round the trees ; but
these, rotten from frequent wettiogs, snapped like thread,
the raft was mend under water beneath the Wm and the
woman and Lord Miltoo brushed off like dies. The raft,
hanging up for a moment against another overhanging tree,
was secured by Assiniboine and Mr. B—, and the pro-
visions saved. Dr. Cheadle, fortunately observing Lord
Milton and the woman clambering along the trunk, drew
the former out, and they together reserved the woman.
It WWI lint simple justice, Mr. Cheadle here stated,
that he should tell what Lord Milton bad never
related, and did not expect to hear, that half-
drowned and in the most imminent danger as he
was, he gasped out, "Never mind Ms ; I can last oat a
little longer: save the woman." (Loud applause.) Is a few
days tho trail in the direction of Cariboo cams to an sad ;
and to the dismay of the party, who had now bat a mall
quantity of provisions, and who with their hones, would
coon be in extremities, they discovered that the large body
of emigrants had abandoned the idea of cutting • way
through these dense forests, and bad evaded the dangers by
enoonotoring another in rafting the unknown river Thomp-
son. The Assiniboine, however, who had explored, natertid
that they could get through the forest, and they accord-
hey set oat on the 31st of July. The mat throe Tasks
were the roost difficult and dangerous period in the whole
undertaking : for the track lay through the moot
Impassable fonds, through winch they had to out
• way. Their meals had to be greatly reduced in number
and quantity, and their provision' even in those circum.
dance*, were ors long exhausted. Their hone* became
almost skeletons; and the Assiniboine, owing to injuries,
Income tameless. Os the 19th, however, their hopes began
to revive, and on the Mid, to their gent delight, they cams
bb • beautiful prairie, and soon after met with Indians,
from whom they obtained food. On the 25th they nomad
to the eastern bank of the Thompson, and on the 29th ar-
rived at Fort Kamloops, where they were most kiadly re-
sobrod by Hr. Mackay. In concluding, the lecturer drew
attostion to& peculiarity of the Thompson and Frew River
valleys—the °wombats on tech of the rivers of perfectly
level terraces in them tiers, earth tier corresponding with
am ea the opposite side of tbs valley. Tho lowest of We
throe, when the valley expands, presents a perfectly fist
surface of a great many sores in extent, rained above
the level of the river both some thirty or forty
lest. Higher atilt, she wend tier he pairally out
eel of the moontaia aide, mallow more than • hundred
yards in width, sad raised about sixty foot above the lows,
ons ; whilst soaked at an InacoriniMs height skim tits fame
et the birds which run down to the river, and probably
400 or 500 fist above it, le the third tier. The lecturer
litiveght this formatioa might be the result of throe greed
esevalaioas of Wars, by ithisk a suesserim of Mee whisk