To the fore, near the pilot, rides the Chief Factor--black beaver hat which must have caused the gentleman a deal of trouble riding under low hanging branches, dark blue or black suit, white shirt, ruffled collar to his ears, frock coat, and when it is cold a great coat with as many capes as a Spanish lady’s mantilla, lined throughout with red or tartan silks. When camp is made, first duty is to erect the Chief Factor’s tent apart from the common people. Though the old Company no longer swash-bucklered a continent in gold braid with swords and pistols in belt, its rulers still kept up the pomp and pageantry of little kings. Near the Chief Factor often rode an incoming missionary. The traders and clerks strung out in a line behind, with the married men and their families to the rear. Bugle or shout roused all hands at five in the morning, but what with breakfast and loading the pack horses and rounding all in line, it was usually ten o’clock before the long caravan began to move forward. The swish of leather leggings against saddle girths, the grass padded trampling of the horses, the straining of the pack ropes as the long line filed zigzag up a steep mountain side to a sky-line pass--all produced a peculiarly drowsy humming sound like a multitude of bees. No stop was made for nooning. With hunters alert for a chance shot to supply the supper table, with other riders nodding half asleep, the brigade wound north and north, through the mossed forests, now among the rolling hills, with here and there a snowy peak looming opal above the far clouds; now in the valleys where the river flowed with a hush and the sunlight came only in shafts; now on the sky-line of a pass where forests and hills and valleys rolled a sunbathed, misty panorama below; now in shadowy cañons where the only sign of life was the eagle circling overhead! Kamloops was the great half-way house for the north-bound brigades. Here, worn horses were exchanged for fresh mounts. Half the far-traveled traders dropped off to stay in this district. The rest for a week enjoyed the luxury of sleep in a bed, and limbs uncramped from saddle stiffness. The fort was palisaded as usual and was the trading post for the Shushwaps and Lower Fraser River Indians. It had been the headquarters of David Thompson, the mountain explorer long ago, and had been named after him; but on a change of the site was called after the name of the Indian lake. The mountains, which have seemed to crush in on the wayfarers like walls, widen out at Kamloops to upland prairies and rolling meadows flanked by forested hills. To the wearied hunters of the north-bound brigades, it was like a garden in a desert, an oasis of life in a wilderness of mountain wilds. Saddles were hung on the wooden pegs stuck in the clay of the log walls and horses turned out to pasture in grass knee-deep. * * * * *