C Ihe Ladies c cu. V'VVAN - History and Classics, Department of

2 I 2 Appendir 1TUESDAY 6 JULYI baked bannock with Sister Firmin's help. Gwen sketched church.At II we both paddled over to creek with Tyrell 2 fish crooked back+ white fish. Saw brown eagle. Overcast d'9' butsun came out Mt. packedour food w. Lazarus, Mr. Parsons +c and then to a tea-Hight?]such a meal at English Mission with Miss Gatt + Hackett + Mr. Geddes+ Mr. Hester. Gramophone music. Then to Dr. final bindingup of Gwen's ankle. Mosquitoes badjine clowjy s9'. Mr. Geddes toldus tale of an Indian taking winter mail to Macpherson:dogteam played out Indian had to lighten mail so took onnewspapers thinking they wd. be most important being heavier:hung up letters on tree they were brought on next year. Herethey got their Xmas mail in February + no mail from Sept. toFebruary. IJwe writefrom Vancouver to tell them o!ourarrival in Yukon thrywill not hear till Feb. Makes one realise the loneliness a bit.WEDNESDAY 7 JULYThe StartGoodbye to the sisters Father + Brothers + many at last at 8o'c!! Left in a swarm of mosquitoes: no one awake. Our 2guides Lazarus + Jimmy: Mr. Parsons + Aberdeen boy inH.B.Co gas boat with our 20 packages 6 sack food 4 boxes food10 of baggage + bedding. Rainbow reflections of RichardsonMts in glassy still water. Sultry day. Away 12 miles up Peel R +then into mouth of Husky R. Banks flat brilliant green ofmare's tail silver willows, green willows + alder + spruce: a fewblack poplar + cottonwood after a while + all the while splashesof blue lupin among the pale green. Saw 2 red foxes: manyducks: 2 swans: white headed eagle. Stopped ashore at 12 toboil kettle. Mosquitoes fairly charged us among the willows:worst experience we've had a thick cloud. All the day we woundabout the sluggish channel at the foot of that Mt range: barrentops lovely green sides with blue patches (Jupin) + greenravines. Afterpassing Black MI. banks a little higher: mud: one sidesloping smoothly like sides of swimming bath the other eatenaway + crumbling the silent action of ice + flood chiselling thesebanks on a more colossal scale than the works of man. Mosquitoes carne +went but very little wind + little sun. Lunched on Pemmicanbannock (which I'd rolled too thin + jam) Wonderful day everybend full of thrill. No gas boats come up this sluggish river: wehave the world to ourselves. Flowers commonest all day theblue lupin, white valerian, mauve vetch, Pyrola, yellow senecio.Blue vetch. At 8 PM after 12 hours running + circling round +round Black Mt. we carne in sunshine to the mouth of the Rat: alittle sluggish river bordered by willows: we have dreamed of itfor months. Landed to boil kettle + refill boat with gasoline:mosquitoes in plenty. Sandpipers nest there in mare's tail 4eggs. Then up an enchanted river. Very narrow + felt it was a jine world all ourown after weeks of vast Mackenzie R. Sunny evening + sprucereflections golden in water banks being too high for sun to falldirectly. Tracks of beaver + geese on mud banks Lazaruswatching keenly + reading them like a book. In this land webegin to seek a handful of wind with the fervour of an Arabseeking a handful of shade. Comes a puff and mosquitoes aregone. Saw Ravens many ducks gulls various waders very manysandpipers. They had a fusillade + alas! Killed a white frontedgoose while the young ones went waddling away up the bank.The Rat winds also so that we still have that wondrous thrillround every bend. Expecting moose + caribou in every snag +bear in every leg. Saw 3 musk rats: serious, rabbit-nosed,yellow, on water's edge, I of them swimming. Gloriousuntrod den feeling as we steamed up Rat as if our own puffingengine were 1st thing to break in on its lifelong silence. 70miles we reckon Aklavik to where Rat enters Huskie R. So on25 miles to Destruction City at 12.30. Saw big owl. Just before wegot there carne in sight of mt. barrier a wonderful mixture ofsunrise + sunset light we carne out from deep channel sprucesilhouetted on yellow sky to mountains seen from a widerspace: one range was a wonderful colour amethyst turning topink + washed in faint rose-coloured dew as it turned sowonderful you expected it to melt away + yet all the time veryclear cut. Destruction City has few remains of the oldKlondiker's settlement: a green range slopes up skywards + atlast we see the land from which the Rat takes rise. Gas boat wentstraight on to Macpherson + we shuffled hungry + sleepy intoour tent on S. side of river. Mosquitoes too awful: we cd. onlyrig our mosquito bar + crawl in fully dressed: took off hat +shoes sprayed ourselves with Flit + so to sleep on a bed ofIndian moss + cranberry. Poured with rain in the night who wasa short one.THURSDAY 8 JULYThe Rat RiverWoke our guides at 8 + we crawled out to a world full ofmosquitoes + had breakfast of fried bacon + bread + jam + blacktea. Got away at 10 gray unrelieved sky + rain on + off. Welanded a good 100 yards up river + then began our jaunt. Wewere put ashore to plunge through willows + alders or along