July 8, 1793. Mustard And Mint.

July 8, 1793.

Daily excerpts from the journal of Alexander MacKenzie, on his overland Voyage to the Pacific Ocean.

     “It rained throughout the night, and it was seven in the morning before the weather would allow us to proceed. The guide brought me five small boiled fish, in  a platter made of bark; some of them were of the carp kind, and the rest of a species for which I am not qualified to furnish a name.”

     “Having dried our clothes, we set off on our march about eight, and our guide very cheerfully continued to accompany us; but he was not altogether so intelligible as his predecessors in our service.” 

     “In this part of the journey we were surprised with the appearance of several regular basons (sic), some of them furnished with water, and the others empty; their slope from the edge to the bottom formed an angle of about forty-five degrees, and their perpendicular depth was about twelve feet. Those that contained water, discovered gravel near their edges, while the empty ones were covered with grass and herbs, among which we discovered mustard, and mint. (Pictures 2 & 3.) 

There were also several places from whence the water appears to have retired, which are covered with the same soil and herbage.”

     The “basons” that MacKenzie has come across are glacial kettles found at the foot of Titetown Lake, which were formed when isolated blocks of ice left by the retreating ice sheet melted. An obvious feature from the ground, they are even more prominent when viewed from above. In fact when looking at the area with Google Earth, and if you start looking for circular impressions in the lower centre of image, you can definitely see more of these basins than just the obvious ones. (Picture 1).

Picture 1. Google Earth Image showing Titetown Lake and MacKenzie’s basons. Top of image is North.

Picture 2. Wild Mint plant, as found in B.C.

Picture 3. Wild Mustard found in B.C. (Photo Northern Bushcraft)