POST CAPTAINS OF 1822.
47
falo robe that belonged to Mr. Hood, and boiled and ate a part of it. In the afternoon, a flock of partridges coming near the tent, Michel killed several, and shared them with us.
“Thick snowy weather and a head-wind prevented us from starting the following day; but on the morning of the 23d, we set out, carrying with us the remainder of the singed robe. In the course of the march Michel alarmed us much by his gestures and conduct, was constantly muttering to himself, expressed an unwillingness to go to the fort, and tried to persuade me to go to the woods on the Copper-mine river, where he said he could maintain himself all the winter by killing deer. In consequence of this behaviour, and the expression of his countenance, I requested him to leave us, and to go to the southward by himself. This proposal increased his ill-nature; he threw out some obscure hints of freeing himself from all restraint on the morrow; and I overheard him muttering threats against Hepburn, whom he openly accused of having told stories against him. He also, for the first time, assumed such a tone of superiority in addressing me, as evinced that he considered us to be completely in his power; and he gave vent to several expressions of hatred towards the white people, some of whom, he said, had killed and eaten his uncle and two other of his relations. In short, taking every circumstance of his conduct into consideration, I came to the conclusion that he would attempt to destroy us on the first opportunity that offered, and that he had hitherto abstained from doing so from his ignorance of his way to the fort, but that he would never suffer us to go thither in company with him. In the course of the day, he had several times remarked that we were pursuing the same course that Captain Franklin had done, and that by keeping towards the setting sun he could find the way himself. Hepburn and I were not in a condition to resist even an open attack, nor could we by any device escape from him. Our united strength was far inferior to his, and, beside his gun, he was armed with two pistols, an Indian bayonet, and a knife. In the afternoon, coming to a rock on which there was some tripe de roche, he halted, and said he would gather it whilst we went on, and that he would soon overtake us. Hepburn and I being now left together, for the first time since Mr. Hood’s death, he acquainted me with several material circumstances which he had observed of Michel’s behaviour, and which confirmed me in the opinion that there was no safety for us except in his death, and he offered to be the instrument of it. I determined, however, as I was thoroughly convinced of the necessity of such a dreadful act, to take the whole responsibility upon myself; and, immediately upon Michel’s coming up, I put an end to his life by shooting him through the head with a pistol. Had my own life alone been threatened, I would not have purchased it by such a measure; but I considered myself as entrusted also with the protection of Hepburn’s; a man who, by his humane attentions and devotedness, had so endeared himself to me, that I felt more anxiety for his safety than for my own, Michel had gathered no tripe de roche,