A Journey From Prince Of Wales's Fort In Hudson's Bay To The Northern Ocean: In The Years 1769, 1770, 1771, 1772

Samuel Hearne, the author of the book here republished, is one of the most interesting characters to be met with in the annals of exploration in North America. When a young man, only twenty-four years old, he was sent on foot to explore the interior of a great continent. Though he knew nothing of mines or minerals, he, like many a man similarly equipped since his day, was to report on a great mining property. Naturally his report on the "mine" of copper is of little value, but his account of Northern Canada and of the life of the natives who inhabited it is the first published detailed description of any portion of the interior of Western Canada. Very few men of his age accomplished so much, and fewer still have published such admirable narratives of their enterprises. All that we know of Hearne's early life is contained in an obituary notice which appeared in the European Magazine and London Review for June 1797, entitled "Some Account of the late Mr. Samuel Hearne, Author of 'A Journey from Prince of Wales Fort, in Hudson's Bay, to the Northern Ocean, undertaken by order of the Hudson's Bay Company for the discovery of Copper Mines, a North-West Passage, &c., in the years 1769, 1770, 1771, and 1772.'"