Mr.Back was mostly prevented from turning his attention to objects of science by the many severe duties which were required of him and which obliged him to travel almost constantly every winter that we passed in America; to his personal exertions, indeed, our final safety is mainly to be attributed.

And here I must be permitted to pay the tribute due to the fidelity, exertion and uniform good conduct in the most trying situations of John Hepburn, an English seaman and our only attendant, to whom in the latter part of our journey we owe, under Divine Providence, the preservation of the lives of some of the party.
(*Footnote.

Given in the Appendix to the Quarto Edition.) I ought perhaps to crave the reader's indulgence towards the defective style of this work, which I trust will not be refused when it is considered that mine has been a life of constant employment in my profession from a very early age.

I have been prompted to venture upon the task solely by an imperious sense of duty when called upon to undertake it.
In the ensuing Narrative the notices of the moral condition of the Indians as influenced by the conduct of the traders towards them refer entirely to the state in which it existed during our progress through the country; but lest I should have been mistaken respecting the views of the Hudson's Bay Company on these points I gladly embrace the opportunity which a Second Edition affords me of stating that the junction of the two Companies has enabled the Directors to put in practice the improvements which I have reason to believe they had long contemplated.

They have provided for religious instruction by the appointment of two Clergymen of the established church under whose direction schoolmasters and mistresses are to be placed at such stations as afford the means of support for the establishment of schools.