Volume 1

TURTLE MOUNTAIN. 413
surrounded with rushes, reeds, and tall grass ;
even willows, was to be seen.
no wood, not
At eleven o'clock we halted,
after some difficulty in getting across small rivulets which
fall into the river from the E/ At one o'clock we were
again on our march, leaving the river to our left, and directing
our course N. E. toward the head or W. end of Turtle
mountain.'" Night came on before we could reach it, which
obliged us once more to stop in the open plain ;
but being
on a rising ground the buffalo dung was tolerably dry, and
we made shift to keep up a smudge to drive off the swarms
of mosquitoes.
Aug. 8th. We were oflf early, and pushed on with speed.
At eleven o'clock we came to the head of Turtle mountain,
where we found the vestiges of several Assiniboine camps,
one only a few days old; had we fallen in with them, our
horses might have been all stolen. We halted on the brow
of the mountain, which appeared to be a very eligible and
convenient summer residence for the Assiniboines and
Crees, judging from the number of old and new vestiges of
camps we saw. It began to rain. I was determined to
proceed, let the weather be ever so bad, but some of our
party thought proper to shelter themselves from the wet
and stop for the night. At one o'clock some of us loaded
and pushed on, carrying our baggage. We soon came to
' That is, from the western slopes of Turtle mt. There are several (not including
the two Henry calls Tete a la Biche). One of the largest is now known
as Boundary cr., as it comes down in Bottineau Co. from the parallel of 49® N.
I was near the head of this stream in the summer of 1873, in the
western foothills
of Turtle mt., whence the distance due W. to the point where Mouse r.
crosses 49° for the fourth and last time is 20 m.
In judging of courses by compass-points
in this locality, allowance must be made for a magnetic variation of
17° E. The longitude of the station here alluded to is 100° 30' W.; and
Mouse r.
finally passes from the United States a little short of loi".
'"
Turtle mt. is so called from its general shape, which is oval, like the carapace
of a turtle, viewed from on top.
Its westernmost end forms a considerable
and well-marked projection from the general oval contour, which represents
the head of the turtle; this is what Henry means by the phrase. To reach
this point he crosses 49° N., past the station mentioned in the last
thus in British America (Manitoba).
note, and is