The Bishop, Dr. Anderson, showed us great kindness and hospitality, and the Governor of Red River, Mr. M‘Tavish, afforded us every assistance in fitting out our expedition. The only drawback to our comfort was the presence of armies of mosquitoes and sand-flies, which attacked us every night. In order to get any sleep, we were compelled to smoke out our tent before turning in. This we effected by cutting a hole in the ground at one end, and lighting a small fire in the bottom, which we covered up with sods and earth when it was well alight. The fire generally continued to smoulder and smoke until morning, but it frequently acted so effectually that we were awakened in the night by a sense of suffocation, and were compelled to rush out of the tent, to escape being stifled. During our stay, Lord Dunmore, and a party of officers of the Guards stationed at Montreal, arrived on their way to hunt buffalo on the plains. Their preparations were soon completed, and they started before us for Fort Ellice, on the Assiniboine. We found, upon careful inquiry, that it was already too late in the season to attempt crossing the mountains before winter. We therefore decided to travel westward, to some convenient point on the river Saskatchewan, and winter there, in readiness to go forward across the mountains the following summer. We also learnt that several parties of emigrants, about 200 in all, chiefly Canadians, had passed through in the early part of the summer, on their way to British Columbia. By the evening of the 22nd of August we had completed our arrangements, ready to start on the morrow. We had engaged four men--Louis La Ronde, our head man and guide, Jean Baptiste Vital, Toussaint Voudrie, and Athanhaus Bruneau, all French half-breeds. La Ronde had a great reputation as a hunter and trapper, and was very proud of having been out with Dr. Rae on some of his extraordinary journeys. He was a fine, tall, well-built fellow, with a handsome face and figure, and was reported to be quite irresistible amongst the fair sex. Vital was a sinister-looking dog, thick-set and bull-necked, surly and ill-conditioned. He professed to have been out with Captain Palliser’s expedition, and was eternally boasting of his skill and bravery in encounters with Indians, and the extraordinary number of grisly bears which he had slain. Voudrie was a little, dark-complexioned fellow, very loquacious and plausible, but making no pretensions to any great knowledge of hunting or travelling. Bruneau was the son of a Red River magistrate--a tall, good-looking fellow, but very simple, and the butt of all the others. Our conversation with the men was carried on in Canadian French, for their knowledge of English was very imperfect. Amongst themselves they used a mixed patois of French and Indian, for a long time perfectly incomprehensible to us.