{331} The 30th brought us to Winipeg river, which we began to ascend, and about noon reached Fort Bas de la Rivière. This trading post had more the air of a large and well-cultivated farm, than of a fur traders' factory: a neat and elegant mansion, built on a slight eminence, and surrounded with barns, stables, storehouses, &c., and by fields of barley, peas, oats, and potatoes, reminded us of the civilized countries which we had left so long ago. Messrs. Crébassa and Kennedy, who had this post in charge, received us with all possible hospitality, and supplied us with all the political news which had been learned through the arrival of canoes from Canada.[194]
They also informed us that Messrs. M'Donald and de Rocheblave had passed, a few days before our arrival, having been obliged to go up Red river to stop the effusion of blood, which would probably have taken place but for their intervention, in the colony founded on that river by the earl of Selkirk.[195] Mr. Miles M'Donnell, the governor of
- [Footnote: the eastern shore of the lower lake. Buffalo Strait is between Buffalo Head on
the east, and a group of islands on the west, of which Black Island is the largest.—Ed.]
