I approached this volume as something I should read to better understand what it was like to explore the Canadian wilderness in the Seventeenth Century. Expecting it to be a bit of a chore, I was pleasantly surprised that Farley Mowat has edited it so it is a very readable journey seeing early Canada and its inhabitants through Samuel Hearne's eyes.

His detailed descriptions of the the various Native groups he met as he traveled to the Coppermine River bring these people alive. While one may find their treatment of their women or their diets abhorrent, Hearne's descriptions make fascinating reading. He rarely criticizes the Native life style except when they went on a killing sprees especially the attacks on the Inuit camps that were really genocide. I suffered chills just reading about their winter travels often with little or no food for days.

Hearne must have been a man of great stamina for he traveled great distances on foot in the most severe weather and only once does he describe having an illness or physical problem and that was with his feet. A truly remarkable man and a great story. ( )