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The British Colonist, January 15, 1863

The Eliza Anderson arrived yesterday evening from New Westminster with about 20 passengers on board. A gentleman who came down from Lillooet supplied us with the following information: Mr. Woodard of Williams Lake, had come down on a sleigh by the wagon road, and reported good traveling thereon. The snow was very light until he came to Pavillion Mountain, where it was nearly a foot deep. At Bonaparte horses and cattle were doing well, the weather being very mild and scarcely any snow on the ground. The former reports about cattle dying there were not true. Small pox had appeared amongst the Indians at Bonaparte, and two squaws had died of the disease.

At Lillooet there has been four cases of small-pox amongst whitemen, one of whom [Hi?] Robinson, being the only victim. Measles had broken out amongst the natives, but not to any serious extent. Messrs. Taylor & Co. of Seaton Lake had made considerable progress with their new steamboat, and the workmen were busily engaged pushing on the work. The new steamer for Pemberton Lake was almost ready for the boilers and machinery. There was no ice on any of the lakes between Douglas and Lillooet, and not over 18 inches of snow on the portages. The communication between those places was not interrupted to the least, wagons being constantly going on the portages and steamers on the lakes. Douglas Lake was frozen over and the steamers could not get up to the town. The Fraser was free from ice.