Show THE RIEL REBELLION Canadian Troops Pushed to the Front Had 12oads and Cold Weather WINNIPEG April 7General Middle ton has begun his advance from Fort Quappelle He has now with him the Winnipeg rifles and a field battery of about 350 men A and B batteries who left here last night reached Quap pelle at 10 oclock A battery will probably be pushed to overtake the first detachment at Touchwood and the first contingent of Toronto troops about 300 will follow in the same line making their column about 750 strong It is said that B battery and the second detachment from Toronto will go on to Swift Current and be taken down to South Saskatchewan Saskatch-ewan in steamers and barges to meet the main column At Clarks Crossing they will make up about 400 men The Queens Own Rifles from Toronto arrived at Port Arthur this morning and will reach here at midnight The Grenadiers from Toronto are about twelve hours behind be-hind them Nothing definite is known of Riels force most contradictory stories being afloat It is lot likely that the rebels will oppose the troops in a body but they may do them much harm by harassing skirmishes on the march across the prairies There is every indication that the advance from Fort Quappelle to Saskatchewan will be one of extreme difficulty The trail is now in a bad state and teams cannot take heavy loads The mud on the road is knee deep in places Men of the batteries and the Queens Own had a hard rip across the uncompleted portions of the Canadian Pacific railway The roads were bad and the weather at times exceedingly eedingly cold the thermometer going go-ing as low as 33 below zero The feeling is almost universal that this hardship and long delay should have been avoided by gaining permission to send troops through the United States |