view raw text
THE SPORTING POLICE OF CANADA Members of Royal Mounted Force Distinguish Themselves as Explorers The decision of the Canadian government to increase the Koyal Northwest Mounted Police force to iiOOO men calls attention to this remarkable body of men and their work as explorers explorersDuring During tlie decade that preceded tlie war they discovered great lakes huge mountain ranges mighty rivers vast herds of game and new tribes of Ijidians and Eskimos whose existence was unsus ¬ pected pectedTake Take for instance the trip of Inspector Pelletier and his three white companions Setting out from Fort Saskatchewan an outlying station far to the north of IllinoaUii they made a journey ef 2343 miles over lSOO miles of which was through terri ¬ tory never before visited by a white man manIn In the then unknown Dog Kib country adjoining Artillery Lake they discovered what is probably the greatest sportsmans paradise on earth and incidentally cleared up a mystery that had for a number of years been puzzling even the officials of the great Hudson Hay Company itself Immense cariliou herds once roamed over the vast barren plains of the nortldaiids but they had been rapidly disappearing and even the Indians who partially lived on them had failed to trace them themPelletier Pelletier and his men discovered the lost caribou far to the north in an unknown and uninhabited wilderness He estimated the main herd alone to number 100000 For hours at a time the party was held up by vast herds swimming across tlie rivers and lakes ahead of them themThis This expedition resulted in filling in a blank space of the map nine times as large as Scotland ScotlandTheir Their most startling discovery perhaps was tlie finding of an Kskimo village TiOO miles from Arctic water and 000 miles from Hudson Hay in command of an Kiiglisliman known as Lucky Moore He had accompanied Hainbiiry on his voyage to the Arctic and had long been reported as dead lie had made himself chief of the Eskimos and had induced his tribe to cinne farther and farther inland inlandDISCOVER DISCOVER GREAT LAKES AND MOUNTAINS MOUNTAINSIt It is difficult to believe that two new lakes almost as large as Lake Ontario and a range of mountains 20 miles long could be discovered within a few hundred miles of flourishing cities without creating nt least some sort of sensation Yet this has happened on several occasions occasionsIn In February PHI Sergeant Macleod was detailed to undertake a hazardous patrol into the unknown country northeast of Fort Atrniilion The result was the discovery of a huge inland sea into which one could dnp the whole of AVales AValesMore More startling still was the exploratory patrol if Sergeant Mellor in the country south of the Creat Slave Lake in 1510 Here they entered a re ¬ gion stretching 700 miles east and west and 200 miles north and south of which nothing whatever was known At the mouth of the Kuffalo Kiver they encountered an unknown Indian tribe but all efforts to induce any of the braves to acompany them failed The Indians declared that the country to the north was filled with deadly yoisons yoisonsA A few days later strange and sickening odors came to them on the Winds Their canoe had now entered the edge f what was literally a world of sulphur The swamps the streams and the endless muskegs reeked witli it itIndauntcd Indauntcd by their personal discomfort Mellor anil his companions pushed on Fortyfive miles from the mouth of the Kuffalo Kiver they came upan a large tributary flowing into thu main stream from the south In places this stream was a mile in width and it ended in a lake which opened up like a great sea After two days of exploration they judged the lake to be from 30 to 41 miles wide and fnm SO to 100 miles in length They also discov ¬ ered a range of mountains stretching a distance of iiver seventy miles As a result of their trip which proved both exciting and dangerous a huge blank on the map was filled in
