The amazed Indians made no motion to molest these mad white men, but tried to explain by signs to Fraser that another great river (the Columbia) led by smooth water to the sea. But Fraser thought he _was_ on the Columbia; and “going to the sea by an indirect way was not the object of the undertaking; I therefore continued our route.” Nevertheless, the Indians were right. The river grew worse and worse. Fraser bought four horses from them and went on, half the men along the shore, half in the canoes. The task of bringing the baggage overland “was as difficult as going by water. We were obliged to pass a declivity, the border of a huge precipice, where the loose gravel slid under our feet. One man with a large pack on his back got so entangled on the rocks he could move neither forward nor backward. I crawled out to the edge and saved his life by dropping his load over the precipice into the river. This carrying place, two miles long, shattered our shoes so that our feet were covered with blisters. A pair of shoes” (moccasins) “does not last a day.” The river grew worse and worse. On the 9th of June “the river contracts to forty yards, enclosed by two precipices of immense height narrower above than below. The water rolls down in tumultuous waves with great velocity. It was impossible to carry canoes by land, so all hands without hesitation embarked as it were _a corps perdu_ upon the mercy of this awful tide. Once in, the die was cast. Our great difficulty was in keeping the canoes clear of the precipice on one side and the gulfs formed by the waves on the other. Skimming along as fast as lightning the crews, cool and determined, followed each other in awful silence; and when we arrived at the end, we stood gazing at each other in silent congratulation at our escape.” Again the Indians waited at the end of the rapids and again they drew maps on Fraser’s oilcloth coverings for baggage, showing which way the river flowed and that canoes could not pass down. The 10th of June, Fraser places his canoes on a shaded scaffolding where the gummed seams will not be melted and hides his baggage in a _cache_. At five A. M. on the 11th, all the crews set out on foot, each man carrying a pack of eighty pounds. Fraser is now between Lillooet and Thompson River, or where the passing traveler can to-day see the old Caribou trail from Lytton to Ashcroft clinging to the mountain like basketwork stuck on a huge wall. The river becomes calmer, and on the fifteenth Fraser buys a canoe from the Chilcotins, which Stuart and two voyageurs pilot, while the rest of the men walk along the banks.