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IIARPEirS

NH:W MONTHLY MAGAZINE.

Vol.. LXXXIV.

MAKCII, 1802.

No. 1)1 1.

"T.\LKIXG MrSQrASII."

ItV .IlIJAN UAI.PH.

rpiIE most sensational bit of " nmsfiuasli
X talk "' in more tlian a quartei" of a cen-
tui'.v ain(»n<,f tlio Hiulson Bay Company's
emplovL's was started the other day, wiien
Sir Donald A. Hmitii, the president of tlie
oldest of Enjifland's great trading,'' eoni-
))aiiies, sent a type-written letl<M' to Wiinii-
pej"'. If a Ci'ee squaw had <;'oiie to llie
tradiii<r-sliop at Moose Factory and asked
foi' a, bustle and a bo.v of faee-powder in
exeiianj^e for a beaver-skin, tiie sujiyestion
of chanjjinj;- conditions in tlio fur trade
would have been trilling' compared with
the sense of instability to v hich this ap-
])earance of macliine- writing gave rise.
Tlie reader may inuigine for himself what
a wrench civilization would have gotten
if the world had laid down its goose-quills
and taken up the type-writer all in one
day. And that is precisely what Sir Don-
ald Smith had done. The quill that had
served to convey the orders ot Alexander
Macken: '8 had satislied Sir George Sim))-
.son ; and, in our own time, while men like
Lord Iddesleigli,Lord Kimberley, and Mi'.
Goschen sat around the candle - lighted
table in the boardroom of the company
in London, quill i)ens were the only ones
at hand. But Sir Donald's letter was not
only the product of a machine; it con-
tained instructions for the use of the
type-writer in the oflices at Winnipeg, and
tliere was in the letter a protest against
illegible manual cliirography such as had
been received from many factories in the
wilderness. Talking business in the fur
trade has always been called " talking
musquash" (musk-rat), and after tliat let-
ter came the turn taken by that form of
talk suggested a general fear that from
the Arctic to our border and from Labra-
dor to Queen Charlotte's Islands the can-
vassers for competing machines will be
CopyriRht, 1892, by Harper and
Vol.. LXXXIV.— No. .•««.— 48

"racing" in all the posts, each to prove
that his instrument can pound out more
words in a minute than any other — in
those jiosts where life hi.s hitiierto been
taken so gently that when one day a
factor heard that the battle of "Waterloo
had been fought and won l)y the English,
he deliberately loaded tin; best trade gun
in the storehouse and weiu out and fired
it into the pul.sele.s.j woods, although it was
two years after the l)attle. and tlie dis-
(piieted Old World had long known the
greater news that Na})oleoii was caged in
St. Helena. The only reassui-ing note in
the "musciuash talk" to-da^' is sounded
when the subject of candles is reached.
The governor and committee in Ijondon
still i)ursue their deliberations by candle-
light.

J?ut rebellion against their fate is idle,
and it is of no avail for the old factors to
make the jioinl that Sir Donald found no
greater trouble in reading their writing
than they encountered when one of his
niissives had to be deciphered by them.
The truth is that the tide of immigration
which their ancient monojioly tirst shunt-
ed into the United St 'I s is now sweeping
over their vast territory, and altering more
than its face. Not only are the factors
aware that the new rule confining them
to share in the prolits of the fur trade
leaves to the mere stockholders far greater
returns from land sales and storekeejiing,
but a great many of them now find vil-
lage life around their old forts, and rail-
roads clo.se at liand, and Law setting up
its otiicers at their doors, so that in a great
jiart of the territory the romance of the
old life, and their author't}' as well, has
lied.

Less than four years ago I had passed
bj' Qu'Appelle without visiting it, but last
Bfothers. All rUjhts reserved.

492

IIARPKRS NKW MONTIIJ.Y MAGAZINE.

siiiimicr I ri'solvcd not to make tin' mis-
tiiko iiyiiiii. for it was llio last slocUaded
foi't that coiihl be sliidiod without u tire-
soiiM' and costly joiinicy into the fai-
north. It is '.n tin! Kishiny- Lakes, Just
beyond Manilol)a. liut on my way a
Hud.son I5ay ollieer told me that they had
just taken down lh(^ slockaiUi in the
sorinff, and that he did not know of a
remainin<if " paii.sadoo "' in all the eompa-
ny's system except one, whi<'h, curiously
enou{;'ii, had just hecMi ordered to he put
up around Fort Ila/ielon, on the Skeena
liiver, in northern British Columhia,
whore some tm'hulent Indians have Ijoen
vei-y troublesome, and wiiero whatever
civilization there uiay bo in Saturn seems
nearer than our own. This one exami)lo
of the survival of orij^inal conditions is
far more eloquent of their endurance!
than tlio thouylitless rcadoi' would ima-
jcine. It is true that tliore has come a tre-
mendous cliange in the stutu.s and spirit
of the company. It is true that its olli-
cers are but lu'wly bendin<jf to external
authority, and that settlers have poured
into the south with such demands for
food, clothes, tools, and weajKnis as to
create within the old corjjoration one of
the larj^ost of shoplceeping companies.
Yet to-da\', as two contui'ies ago, the
Hudson Bay Com[)any remains tiio great-
est fur-tradinj^' association that exists.

The zone in which Fort Ilazleton is
sitiuited reaches from ocean to ocean witli-
out sutrerinj^' invasion l)y settlers, and far
above it to the Arctic Sea is a snu'd belt
wherein time has made no impress since
the lirst factory was put up there. Tiiere
and around it is a re<>ion, neai'ly two-
thirds the size of the United States, which
is as if our country were meaj^rely dotted
with tiny villages at an average distance
of live days apart, with no other means of
comnnnucalion than canoe t)r dog ti'ain,
and with not above a thousand white
men in it, and not as many pure-blooded
white women as you will lind registered
at a tirst-class New York hotel on an oi'di-
nary day. The company employs be-
tween 15U0 and 2000 white men, and I am
assuming that half of them are in the fur
country.

We know that for nearly a century the
company clung to the shores of Hudson
Bay. It will be interesting to peep into
one of its fcrts as they were at that time;
it will be amazing to see what a country
that bay - shore territory was and is.

There and over a vast territory three sea-
sons come in four nuniths — sjiring in
June, summer in duly and xVugust, and
autumn in September. During the l(»ng
winte»' the earth is l)iankeled deep in
snow, and tiie water is locked beneath
ice. (Jeese, ducks, jind smaller lairds
abound as probalry they are not seen
elsewhere in America, but they either
give |)iace to or shart; the summer with
mos<[uitoes, l)lack-llies, and "bull-dogs"
(fdlxiiuis) without nund)er, i-est, or mercy.
J'or th(! land around Hudson Bay is a
vast level mrrsh, so wet that York Fort
was built on piles, with elevated jtlat-
forms around the buildings for the men
to walk upon. Infrequent bunches of
small |)iues and a litter of stunted swamp-
willows dot the level waste, the only con-
siderable timber being found u))on the
banks of the I'ivers. There is a wide belt
called the Arctic Barrens all along the
north, but below that, at some distaiico
west of the l)ay, the great forests of Cana-
da bridge across the region north of the
l)rairie and the plains, and cross the
Rocky Mountains to reach the Pacific.
In the far north the musk-ox descends
almost to meet the moose and deer, and
on the near slope of the Rockies the wood-
buH'alo— larger, darker, and fiercer than
the bison of the plains, but very like him
— still roams as far south as where the
butt'alo ran highest in the days when he
existed.

Through all this norlhei-n country the
cold in winter registers 40°, and even 50°,
below zero, and the travel is by dogs and
sleds. There men in camp may bo said
to dress to go to bed. They leave their
winter's store of dried meat and frozen
lish out ()f-d()ors on racks all winter land
so they do down close to Lake Superior) ;
they hoar from civilization only twice a
year at the utmost: and when sui)plies
have run out at the posts, we have heard
of their boiling the parchment sheets
they use instead of glass in their windows,
and of their cooking the fat out of beaver-
skins to keep from starving, though bea-
ver is so precious ihat such recour.se could
only be had when the horses and dogs
had been eaten. As to the value of the
beaver, the reader who ncer has pur-
chased any for his wife may judge Avhat
it must be by knowing that the company
has long imported buckskin from Labra-
dor to sell to the Chippeways around
Lake Nipigou in order that they may

"TAI.K'INO MTSQUASH.'

not bo t<'in|)(('d, its of old. to niaki' llionys :iihI iiioccii.siiis of tli;; beuver; for tlicir
aro poor, willi sluiis full of woi-iii liolcs. wlu'rt'as Ijcavrr icatlicr is very loiij^'li and
l>ut ill spite of tlie severe cold winters, tliat are, in faet, ••onnnon to all tin
territory, winter is llie delijL^litful season for tlie Iradei's; around tlio
bay it is llie only enduraljle season. Tiie winjjed pests of wliieli
I Inivo spoken are l)y no means confined to the tide-.soaked
reu'ion close to liie <;reat inland sea. The wliole country is
us wet as that oranye of w hich yeoj^'rapliers spi
tliey tell us that the water on tlie earlli's
proportionecl as if we wert; to rub a roujj:;h
with a wet cloth. Uf) in what we use(:
call British America tlu^ illustration is
itself illustrated in the countless lakes
of all sizes, tlu; iniuinierable
small streams, and the many
great rivers that make
waterways tlie roads,
as canoes are the
wajfons.of the
rej^ion. It
is a vast

l!);j

deer

line.

fur

INDIAN HUXTEItS MOVING CAMP.

paradise for nios(iui-
toes, and I have
l)een bunted out of
ishini? and liuntinj^
<?rounds by them as far south as th'j bor-
der. Tlie ■' bull-do<»-" is a terror reserved
for especial districts. lie is the Sioux of
the insect world, as p'-etty as a warrior in
buckskin and beads. i)ut carry in<? a red-
hot sword blade, which, when sheathed in
human tiesb, will make the victim jump

r^t>113

494

HAUrER'S NEW MONTIIIA' MAGAZINE.

a foot from (lie pfroiiiid, llioiiyii (Ih-i''' is
no afl(M'-i)aiii or iU-liin;,'' oi* suclliny from
Iho Uiriist.

Ilaviii;,'' seen tlic comitry, l<'t tis turn to
tlic forts. Some of tliciii rt!ally were forts,
ill so far as palisades and sentry towers
and doiil)l(> doors and (^fiins can make a
fort, anci one twenty miles lielow \Vi;ini
])eir was a stone fort. It is still standinjf.
Wlien the company ruled tlie territory as
its landlord, the defended i)osts were on
the i)lains amony th(> bad Indians, and on
the lIud.son Bay KJiore, where vessels of
foreijfii nations mi<jht be expeeted. In
the for(\sts, on th(> lakes and rivers, th«i
cliaraeter and behavior of the fish eatin^j
Indians did not warrant armament. The
stockaded forts were nearly all alike. The
stockade was of timber, of about such a
heij^Iit that a man mijijht look over it on
tiptoe. It had towers at the corners, and
York Fort had a {jreat "lookout" tower
within the enclosure. Within the barri-
cade were the company's buildinj]fs, mak-
ini>' alto^i'ether such a jjicture as New York
',)resented when tiie Dutch founded it
and called it New Amsterdam, except that
we had a church and a stadt house in our
encIos\u"e. The Hudson Bny buildinf,''s
were sometimes arran^ftd in a hollow
square, and sometimes in the sha])e of a
letter II, with tlu^ factor's house connect-
ing the two other ])arts of the character.
The factor's hou,se was the best dwelling,
hut there were many smaller ones for the
laborers, n\echanics, hunters, and other
non-connnissioned men. A long, low,
whitewashed log hou.se was apt to be the
clerks' house, and otlier large buildings
were the stores where merchandise Avas
kept, the fur-houses where the fur.s, skins,
and pelts were stored, and the Indian
trading-house, in which all the bartering
was done. A jiowder house, ice-house,
oil-house, and either a stable or a hoat-
house for canoes completed the post.
All the houses had double doors and win-
dows, and wherever the men lived there
was a tremendous stove set up to battle
with the cold.

The abode of jollity was the clerks'
house, or bachelors' quarters. Each man
had a little bedroom c(nitaiuing his chest,
a chair, and a hed, with the walls cover-
ed with pictures cut from illustrated pa-
pers or not, according to each man's
taste. The big room or hall, where all
met in the long nights and on orl' days,
was as have as a baldpate so far as its

whitewashed or timl)er"d walls went, hut
the (al)le in the niiddh; wiis littered with
])ipes, tobacco, i)ai)er,s, books, and ))ens
and ink, and all around stood (or i-csted
on hooks overiiead) guns, foils, and lish-
ing-i'ods. On Wednesdays and Satur-
days there was no work in at least one
big factory. Breakfast was served at
nine o'clock, dinner at one o'clock, and
te.i at six o'clock. The food varied in
dill'erent places. All over the prairie
and plains great stores of ])('mmican wen;
kei)t, and men grew to like it very nnich,
though it was nothing but dried Ijutl'alo
beef i)oundcd and mixed with melted fat.
But where they had i)emmican they also
enjoyed bulFalo hunch in the sea.son,
and that was the greatest delicacy, except
moose mulUe (the no.s«! of the moose),
in all the territory. In the woods and
lake country there were venison and
moose as well as beaver— w'lich is very
good eating— and many sorts of birds,
but in that region dried iish (salmon in
the west, and lake trout or white-lish
nearer the bay) was the staple. The
young fellows hunted and iished and
smoked and drank and listened to the
songs of the vcyagenrs and the yarns of
the "breeds" and Indians. For the rest
there was ])lenty of woi-k to do.

They had a costume of their own, and,
indeed, in that res])ect there has been a
sad change, for all the people, white, red,
and crossed, dressed i)icturesquely. You
could always disiinguish a Hud.son Bay
man by his capote of light blue cloth
with brass buttons. In winter they wore
as much as a Quebec carter. They wore
leather coats lined with flannel, edged
with fur, and double-breasted. A scarlet
worsted belt went around their waists,
their breeches were of smoked buckskin,
reaching down to three pairs of blanket
socks and moose moccasins, with blue
cloth leggins up to the knee. Their
buckskin mittens were hung from their
necks by a cord, and usually they
wrapped a shawl of Scotch i)laid around
their necks and shouldo'-s while on each
one's head was a fur cap with earpieces.

The French Canadians and "breeds,"
who were the voyageurs and hunters,
made a gay appearance. Tliey used to
wear the coaipany's regulation light blue
capotes, or coats, in winter, with flannel
shirts, either red or blue, and corduroy
trousers gartered at the knee with head-
work. They all wore gaudj' worsted

""■■x.

,•■ ..*"

TALKING MUSQUASH.

4'J(5

IIALM'KRS NKW MONTHLY MAOAZINK.

8ETTIN(i A MINK TRAP.

belts, loii": lieavy woollen stockiiifjs—
covored wiLli fjayly frinjjccl loyyins— fiiii-
<'V iiioccasiiis, !iii(l tiMjiu's. or fciitlicr-dcfiv-
cd liats or caps l)oiiiul with tinsel hands.
In mild woatlior their costume was form-
ed of a hln(^ striped cotton shirt, coi'du-
roys, blue cloth leffffins hound with or-
ange rihhons, the inevitahlesash or worst-
ed belt, and moccasins. Every liunter
carried a ])o\vder-horn slunjr from liis
neck, and in his belt a tomahawk, which
often served also as a i)ipe. As late as
18G2. Viscount Milton and W. B. Cheadle
describe tliem in a book. The NortJnivst
Passfificbi/ Laud, in the fv)]lowino: graph-
ic language:

"'J'lio nx'ii iippeiucd in gaudy array, with
beadt'tl lire-ltag, gay Kasli, blue or scarlet Icg-
giiigH.girt liclow tlio kiH'c with beaded garters,
and iiioeeasiiis elal>()rately embroidered. 'J'lie
(liall'-lireed) women were in .sliort, liriglit-rol-
ored .sliirts, sliowing rielily cmliroidered leg-
gings and wliite, nioceasins of earilioo-skin
lieanlifnily worlied with tlowory i)atterns in
lieads, silk, and inoosc hair."

The trading-room at an o])en post was
-»-and is now — like a cross-roads store,
having its shelves laden with every ima-
ginable article that Indians like and hunt-
ers need— clothes, blankets, files, scalp-

knives, gun screws, ithitfl
twine, lire - sleel.s, awls,
l)eads, needh's, scissors,
knives, pins, kitclien ware,
guns, powder, and sliot. .\n
, Iridiiin who came in wilii

fuis threw them down, and
when they were counted
received tlu' riglit niunher
of castors litth' piec-es of
wood wiiicli served as mon-
ey— wit ii wiiieli. after tiie
hours of rellection an Ind-
ian s|)cnds at such a time,
he bought what he wanted,
liut tiier(> was a wide
ditference between such a
trading-room and one in the
])lains country, or wliere
tliere were tlangerous Ind-
ians— su(di as some of the
Crees. and the (.'iiii)peways,
^' Bla<d<feet. Jiloods, Sarcis,
Sioux, Sicanies, Stonies,
and others. In such places
the Indians were let in only
one or tw » at a timi', the
goods were hidden so as not
to e.xcite tiieir cui»idity, and
through a square hole grated with a cross
of iron, whose spaces were only large
enough to jiass a blanket, what they
wanted was given to tliem. Tliat is all
done away with now, except it be in
northern British Columbia, where the
Indians have l)een turbulent.

Farther on we shall i)erhaps see a band
of Indians on their way to trade at a
post. Their custom i.s to wait until the
lir.st signs of spring, and then to ))ack up
their winter's store of furs, and take ad-
vantage of the last of the snow^ and ice
for the journey. Tiiey hunt from No-
vember to May; but the trapping and
shooting of bears go on until the 15th
of June, for those animals do not come
from their winter dens until May be-
gins. They come to the posts in their
best attire, aiul in the old days that
formed as strong a contrast to their ])re-
sent dress as their leather tepees of old
did to the cotton ones of to day. Ballan-
tyne, who wrote a book about his .service
with the great fur conii>anj', says merely
that they were painted, .and with scalp
locks fringing their clothes, but in Lewis
aiul Clarke's journal we read desci-iption
after description of the brave costuming
of these color-and vornament-loviiig peo-

» \

"TAI,KINU MUS(^UASH."

4117

j)lo. Tiiko tin' Siniix, for iiisliiin'r. Tlioir
Ih'iiUs wore .slui vrd of jill l)iil :i liifl of
liiiir, and fciitlici-s Imii^' from Hint. In
stciul of lli(> iiuivcrsal blanket of (odav.
tlicii' main ^'armrnt was a rolx- of Itnll'alo
skin with tiii> fur Icfi. on. and lli<> inner
Ktirface di'essed wliitc. painted ^faudily
witli lijriires of IwiihIs iind qneor desi^'iis,
and friny'ed with |ioi'cn|iine (iniiis. Tliey
wore tin- fnr side out only in wet wea-
tiior. ]5eneatli tli« rolw they woruuHhirt
of dressed skin, and under that a h'ather
belt, under wliicli liie ends of a hreeeii
clout of cloth, blanket stuff, or skin were

trivon out. eaeli Indian liad to .surrender
his knife before he yot his tin <mii».

The company made e;reat use of the
li'o(|uois. and consi(h'red them the best
lioalmen in Canada. Sir Alexander
.Mackenzie, of tin- Northwest ('onipany,
employed ci;r|it of them to paddle him to
thu Pacific Ocean by way of the Peace
and l""raser rivi'rs, ami when the {greatest
of Hudson Hay executives. Sir (ieorffo
Simpson, travelled, Iroquois uhvays pro-
pelled him. The company had a uni-
form for all its Indian employes a blue,
^;ray, or blanket capote, very loose, and

WOOD INDIANS COME TO TRADE.

tucked. They wore lefjcnrins of dressed
antelope hide with scali> locks frluffinff
the seams, and i)retti]y headed moccasins
for their feet. They had lU'cklaces of
the teeth oi' claws of wild beasts, and
each carried a fire-baj"'. a quiver, and a
brij^htly i)aiiited shield, oiviuff up the
quiver and shield when g'uns came into
use.

The Indians who came to trade were
admitted to the store precisely as A'oters
are to the polls under the Au.stralian sys-
tem—one bj' one. They had to leave
their guns outside. "When rum was

reachiii}'' below the knee, with a red
worsted belt around the waist, a cotton
shirt, no trousers, but artfully beaded
Icfroins with wide flaps at the seams,
and inocciisins over blanket .socks. In
Aviuter tliey v.'ore buckskin coats lined
with flannel, and mittens were yiven to
them. We have .seen how the half-
breeds were di-essed. They were lonj?
employed at Avomen's work in the forts,
at makin<r clothinjr and at mending'. All
the mittens, moccasins, fur ca])s, deer skin
coats, etc., were made by them. They
were also the washer-women.

49H

IIAlil'KUS NKW MONTHLY MAGAZINE.

^'■k

I'crlnipM tlif fiictrir IkkI a iruod litiic in
lliit 1)1(1 (hi.vs. Id' llioii^jlil Id- <li(l. He liiid
IV wift'iiml scrviiiils imd luiMfs, .iikI wlim
a visitor ciimf, wliioii wus not, as nl'ini as
8ii(»w (Iril'ls lilcw ovt'i" tilt' sluclvatlf, lie
eiilfi'taiiH'd lil<<' 'i loi'd. Al, lir.sl tiif far
tors used to snid lo I^oiidoii, to tin; licad
ollici', for II wif«!. to l)o 11(1(1(^(1 to tl'c aii-
iiiial coiisiiiiiiiM'iit of ji'oods, and tiicic
niiisl liavc liccii a few wiio sciil. to (lie
OrkiK.ys for tlio NW('('(li('arlH tliey left
tlicrc. \\\\\, ill liiiH' lln^ rule caiiH! lo Iks
tliat tlicy married Indian siiuaws. In
doiiijr this, not cvt'ii llio (Irst iiinoii;!f tlicin
acted hiiiidly. for their old rivals and
Hul>sei|Ment conipanioiis of tlie N;)rtli\vest
and X. Y. ('ompanies liey'an lli(> ciistoin,
and III!' Freiicli rojfdf/cKis and <utnrrifrx
(In hois liad mated with Indian women
before tlier(> was a Hudson Bay (.'ompaiiy.
Tlieso roii}fli and Iiaidy woodsmen, and
a lai'tfcr niimlier of iialf-liriM'ds born of
just sncli alliances, l)ei,''aii at an early
day to settle near the tradiiifjc - posts.
Sometimes they estal)lish(>(l what iniK'lit
lie called villages, hut were really close
imitations of Indian camps, composed of
II cluster of skin tepce.s, nicks of (Isli or
iiKvit, and a swarm of doj^s, women, and
children. In each tepeo was tli(! lire-
place, beneath the Hue formed by the
open to]) of the habitation, and around it
wer(^ th(^ beds of brush, covered with soft
liides, th(^ inevitable copper kettle, the
babies swaddled in i)lankets or mossbafys,
the women and do<,''s, the j^un and pad-
dle, and the junks and strips of raw meat
lian<,nn<;' overhead in the smoke. This
lias not ehaiijjed to-day; indeed, very lit-
tle that I shall speak of has altered in
the true or far fur country. The camps
exist yet. They are not so clean (or,
ratber, the}" are more dirty), and the
clothes and food are poorer and harder
to get; that is all.

The Euro])eans saw that these women
were docile, or were keiit in order easily
by flogi^ings with the tent poles; that
tliey were faithful and industrious, as a
rule, and that they were not all unpre-
pos.ses.siii<j— from their yioint of view, of
course. Therefore it came to pass that
these were the most frequent alliances in
and out of the posts in all that country.
The consequences of this custom were so
peculiar and important that I must ask
leave to pause and consider them. In
Canada we see that the white man thus
made his bow to the redskin as a brother

in the truest sense The old CDiirn'i'rH
of Norman and Hreton stock, loving a
wild, (vrf life, and in complete sympathy
with the Inditin, bought or to(d< th(>
.sipiawN lo wife, learned the Indian dia-
lects, and sliai'cd their food and adven
tui-es with the tribes. As moi-e and more
entered the wilderness, and at last ciiiik^
to be supported, in cainps and at post»
and as m/ja^frnrs. \)y l\n' competing fur
companieH, there jjrev; up a class of half-
breeds who spoke K lolish and French,
married lixlians, and were as much at
home wilh the savajf(!s as with th(! whites.
From this stock the Hudson Hay men
have had a better choice of wives for
more than a century. Hut when these
" breeds" were turbulent and mniderous
— first in the attacks on Selkirk's colony,
and next duriny the Itiel rebellion— the
Indians remained quiet. They deliiied
their position when, in 181!), the}' were
tempted with •.'•reat bribes to massacre the
Ked River colonists. "No," said they;
"the colonists are our friends." The
men who souf^ht lo excite them to mur-
der were the ollicers of the Northwest
Company, who bougjit furs of them, to
be sure, but the colonists bad shared wilh
the Indians in poverty and plenty, K'ivinj?
now and takinj,'' then. All were alike to
the red men— friends, white men, and of
the race that had taken so many of their
women to wife. Therefore they went to
the colonists lo tell them what was being
jilanned against them, and not from that
day lo this has an Indian band taken the
war-path against the Canadians. I have
read General Custer's theory that the
United States had to do with meat-eating
Indians, whereas the Canadian tribes are
largely fish -eaters, and I have seen ten
thousand references lo the better Indian
policy of Canada; but I can see no dill'er-
ence in the two policies, and between
the Rockies and the Great Lakes I liiid
that Canada bad the Slonie.s, Hlackfeet,
and many other fierce tribes of butl'alo-
liunlers. It is in the .slow, close growing
acquaintance between the two j-accs, and
in the just policy of the Hnls. n Bay
men toward the Indians, tl)8' ' see the
reason for Canada's enviable) c:v; •ience
with her red men.

But even the Hudson F,i\y ntc <- have
had trouble with the Indiais ;ii recent
years, and one serious affair }.i "w out of
the relations between the company's sei*-
vants and the squaws. There is etiquette

* >

v''!i

CO
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9
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60*^

IIAKI'ERS NKW MONTHLY ^lAOAZINK.

A VOYAOEUH OH CAXOE MAX OF GREAT
SLAVE L/ KE.

even ainoiifj- savages, and this was io'iiored
up at old Fort St. Johns, on the Peace
River, vitli tlio result that the Indians
slaughtered tlie people there and burned
the fort. They were Sicanie Indians of
that region, and after they liad massacred
the men in eliarge, tliey met a boat-load
of white men coming up the river with
goods. To them they turned their guns
also, and only four esca])ed. It was up
in that country likewise — just this side
of the Rocky Mountains, where the jjlains
l)egin to bo forested— that a silly clerk in
a post ([uarrelled with an Indian, and
said to him. "Before you come l)ack to
this post again, your wife and child will
be dead." He spoke hastily, and meant
nothing, but squaw and i)ai)poose hap-

jH-Mcd to di<> that winter, and the Indian
walked inlo tlie fort the next si)ring and
shot the clerk without a word.

Today llie posts are little village-like
collections of buildings, usually showing
white against a green background in tlie
prettiest way imaginable; for, as a rule,
they cluster on tlie lower bank of a river,
or the lower near shore of a lake. There
are not clerks enough in most of them to
ren(U'r a clerks' house necessary, for at
the little ])osts half-breeds are seen to do
as good service as Europeans. As a rule,
there is now a store or trading-house and
a fur-house and the factor's house, the
canoe -liouse and the stable, with a barn
wliere gardening is done, as is often the
case when soil and clinuite i)ermit. Often
the fur-house and store are combined, the
furs being laid in the upper story over
the shop. There is always a llag-stall', of
course. This and the flag, with tlie let-
ters '• H. B. C." on its field. l(>d to the old
hunters' saying that the initials stood for
" Here before Clu'ist," because, no matter
liow far away from the frontier a man
might go. in regions he fancied no white
man had been, that flag and those letters
stared liim in the face. You will often
find that the factor, rid of all the ancient
timidity that called for "j)alisadoes and
swivels," lives on the high vii)per bank
above the store. Tlie usual half-breed or
Indian village is .seldom farther than a
couple of miles away, on the same water.
The factor is still, as he always has been,
responsible only to himself for the disci-
pline and management of his post, and
therefore among the factories we will
find all sorts of homes — homes Avhere a
piano and the magazines are ]n'ized. and
daughters educated abroad shed the lustre
of rennement upon their surroundings,
homes where no woman rules, and homes
of the French half-breed type, which we
shall .see is a very difTereiit mould from
tliat of the two sorts of British half-breed
that are numerous. Tiiere never Avas
a rule by which to gauge a post. In one
you found religion valued and missiona-
ries welcomed, while in others there never
was sei-moii or hymn. In .some, Ilud.son
Bay rum met the ruin of the free-traders,
and in others no rum was bartered away.
To day, in this latter respect, the Domin-
ion law ])revail.s, and rinii may not be
given or sold to the red man.

"When one thinks of the lives of these
factors, hidden away in forest, mountain

■■<•.

TALKING MUSQUASH."

501

cliain, or plain, or arctic l)arr('ii. sccins' 'Jx^"
saiiif very lew faces year in and year
out, witli breaches of the monotonous
routine onc«} a year wiien the wintei's
fnrs are hrouji'iit in, and once a ..'ear w lien
tiie mail-packet arrives — when one thinks
of tlh-ir isolation, and lacU of most of
those inllnences which we in our walks
])rize the hijihest. the i-eason for tjieir
choosin'f tliat company's service .seems
almost mysterious. Yet the}- will tell
you there is a fascination in ii. This
could be understood so far as the half-
breeds and French Canadians were con-
cerned, for they inherited the likiuK': and.
after all. thoujj^h most of thein are only
laborers, no other laborers are so free, and
none spice life with so nnich of adven-
ture. But the factors are mainly men of
ability and jrood origin, well fitted to oc-
cupy responsible positions, and at better
salaries. However, from tlie outset the
rule has been that they have become as
enamored of the trader's life as soldiers
and sailors always have of theirs. They
have usually retired from it reluctantly,
and some, bavin i^ jjone home to Europe,
have befifg'ed leave to return.

The company has always been man-
ajred upon scmietiiinnf like a military basis.
Perhajjs the original necessity for forts and
inen trained to the use of arms sujrs'ested
this. The uniforms were in keepinii' with
the rest. The lowest rank in the service
is that of the laborer, who may happen to
iisb or hunt at times, but is employed —
or enlisted, as uhe fact is, for a term of
years — to cut wood, shovel snow, act as a
l)orter or gardener, and labor geiuM-ally
about the post. Tiie interpreter was usu-
ally a promoted laborer, but long ago the
men in the trade. Indians and whites
alike, met eacli otiier half-way in tlie
matter of language. The highest non-
conunissioned rank in early days was
that of the ))ostniaster at large posts. Men
of that rank often got charge of small
outposts, and we read that they w(>re
"on terms of equality with gentlemen."
To-day the service has lost these line
points, and the laborers and conuiiissioned
ollicers are sharply separated. The so-
called "gentleman " begins as a "prentice
clerk, aiul after a few years becomes a
clerk. His next elevation is to the rank
of a junior chief trader, and soon through
the grades of chief trader, faclor.and cliief
factor, to the oflice of chief commissioner,
or resident American manager, chosen by

the London board, and having fidl jjowers
delegated to him. A clerk— or "dark,"
as llie i-ank is called— may never touch a
pen. He may be a trader. Then again he
mav be ti'uly an accountant. "With the
rank he gels a commission, and that en-
titles him to a minimum giuirantee. with
a conditional extra income bascMl on the
prolitsof the fui' trade. !Men get, promo-
lions through the chief commissioner,
and he has always made fitne.sf,. rather
than senioi'ity. the criterion. Retiring
ollicers are salaried for a term of years,
the original pension fund and system
having btien broken up.

Sir Donald A. Smith, the i)resent gov-
ernoi" of the company, made his way to
the highest post from the jilace of a 'pren-
tice clerk. He canu> fi-om Scotland as a
youth, and aftei- a time was so unfortu-
nate as to be sent to the coast of Labra-
dor, where a man is as nmch out of both
the world and contact with the heart of
the company as it is j)o.ssible to be. The
military system was felt in that instance;
but every man who accejjts a commission
engages to hold himself in readiness to go
cheerfully to the north pole, or anywhere

:-'4'>^"

VOYAGEUR WITH TIMPU.N'E.

>^b'i /,,

602

HARPERS NKW MONTHLY MAGAZINE.

between Liibi-iuloi' and tlio Qium'm Char-
lotte Islands. However, to a man of Sir
Donalds parts no obstacle is more tlian
a temnorary impedimriit. Tliouj^h he
staid something liUe m venteen years in
Labrador, he worked t'ailhfiilly when
there was work to do, and in his own
time lie read and studied voraciously.
Wlien the Riel rebellion — tlie first one —
disturbed the country's peace, beapl)eared
on the .scene as commissioner for thej^ov-
ernment. Ne.xt he became chief conunis-
sioner for the Hudson Bay Company. Af-
ter a time he resifj^ned that otiice to ofo
on tiie board in London, and thence lie
stepped easily to the governorship. His
parents, whose bome was in Moraysbire,
Scotland, j^ave him at liis birth, in 1821,
not only a constitution of iron, but that
shrewdness which is only Scotch, and ho
afterward developed remarkable foresi<;ht,
and such a gra.sp of affairs and of comple.K
situations as to amaze his associates.

Of course his career is almost as singu-
lar as his gifts, and the governorship can
scarcely be said 'o be the goal of the gen-
eral ambition, for it has been most a])t to
go to a London man. Esen ordinary
promotion in the company is very slow,
and it follows that most men live out
their existence between the rank of cleric
and that of chief factor. There are two
hundred central posts, and innumerable
dci)endent posts, and the ollicers are con-
tinually travelling from one to another,
some in their districts, and the chief or
supervising ones over vast reaches of
country'. In winter, when dogr: ""d sleds
are used, the men walk, as a rule, and it
has been nothing for a man to trudge
a thou.sand miles in that way on a win-
ters journey. Roderick Macfarlane, who
was cut oft" from the world u]) in the
Mackenzie district, became an indefatiga-
ble explorer, and made most of his jour-
neys on snow-shoes. He exploited the
Peel, the Liard, and the Mackenzie, and
their surrounding regions, and went far
within tlie Arctic Circle, wliere he found-
ed the most northerly post of the com-
pany. By the regular packet from Cal-
gary, near our border, to the northernmost
post is a three-thou.sand-mile journey.
Macfarlane was fond of the study of or-
nithology, and classified and catalogued
all the birds that reach the frozen re-
gions.

I beard of a factor far up on the east
side of Hudson Bay who reads his daily

newspaper every morning with liis cof-
fee—but of course such an instance is a
I'ai-e one. .He manages it by having a
comi)lete set of the Loudon Times .sent to
liiu' by each winter's packet, and each
morning the i)aper of that date in the
preceding year is taken from the bundl(>
by his servant and dampened, as it had
been when it left the jiress, and spread by
the factor's plate. Thus he gets for half
an hour each day a taste of his old habit
and life at home.

There was aiu)ther factor who devel-
oped artistic capacity, and spent his lei-
siM'e at drawing and paijiting. He did
so Avell that he ventured tnany sketches
for the illustrated pai)ers of London,
some of which were published.

The half breed lias developed with the
age and growth of Camida. There are
now half-breeds and lialf -breeds, and
some of them are titled, and others
hold high official places. It occurred
to an English lord not long ago, wliile
lie was being entertained in a govern-
ment house in one of the ])arts of newer
Canada, to inquire of his liost, "What
are these half-breeds I hear about? I
should like to see what one looks like."
His host took the nobleman's breath
away by his reply. "I am o..e," .said
he. There is no one who has travelled
much in western Canada who has not
now and then been entertained in homes
where either the man or woman of the
liousehold was of mixed blood, and in
such homes I have found a high degree
of refinement and the most polished
manners. Usually one needs tlie infor-
mation that such persons pos.sess such
blood. After that the peculiar black
hair and certain facial features in the
subject of such gossip attest the truthful-
ness of the assertion. There is no rule
for measuring the character and quality
of this plastic, receptive, and often very
ambitious element in Canadian society,
yet one may say broadly that the social
position and attainments of these people
have been greatly influenced by tlie na-
tionality of their fathers. For instance,
the French habitants and woodsmen far,
far too often sank to the level of their
wives when they married Indian women.
Light-hearted, careless, unambitious, and
drifting to the wilderness because of the
absence of restraint there; illiterate, of
coar.s'3 origin, fond of whiskey and gam-
bling — they threw oft' superiority to the

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504

HARPER'S NEW MONTilLY MAGAZINE.

Indiiin, and cviulcd rcsponsihility iiiid
coiicci'ii ill lioiiic iiiaii!i;^«MiH'iit. Of coiirso
tliis is not i; rule, l)iil a tendency. On
the otiier iiaiid, the Hcoteh and Eii<;lisii
forced their wives np to tiieir own stand-
ards. Tlieir own iionie trainiii},'', res|)ect
for more tlnin tiie forms of reh^iion, their
love of iionie and of ii perniaiient patcii
of ji^round of tiieir own— ail the.se had
tlieir etlVct. and that has ■,oen to rear
half-lireed children in jiroud and com-
forlahle homes, to .send them to mix with
tli(! children of cnitivated persons in old
comnninities, and to lit them with pride
and amhition and cultivation for an
e(pial start in the journey of life. Pos-
sessiii','' sucli foundation for it, the equal-
ity has liappily never heen denied to
them in Canada.

To-day the service is very little more
invitinj;' than in the olden time. The
loneliness and removal from the touch of
civilization rem lin throuf^hout a vast re-
gion ; the arduous journeys hy sled and
canoe remain; the daii<^ers of Hood and
frost are niidiminislied. Unfortunately,
anion}.' the chan<;es made l)y time, one is
that wiiicli rohs the present factor's sur-
roundiii<>'s of a great part of that which
was mo; t ])icturesque. Of all the pretti-
nesses of tiie Indian costuming one sees
now oi'.iy a trace liere and there in a
few trihes, while in many tlie moccasin
and tepee, and in .some only the moccasin,
remain. The birch -bark canoe and the
snow-shoe are the main reliance of both
races, but the steamboat has been im-
pressed into parts of the service, and most
of the descendants of the old-time coi/a-
yeiir preserve only his worsted belt, his
knife, and his cap and moccasins at the
utmost. In places the oigage hm become
a mere deck hand. His scarlet paddle
has rotted away; he no longer aw. 'lens
the echoes of forest or cafiou with chan-
sons that (Tied iu the throats of a genera-
tion that has gone. In return, the hor-
rors of intertribal war aiul of a precari-
ous foothold among fierce and turbulent
bands have nearly vanished; but there
was a spice in tliem that added to tlie fas-
cination of the service.

The dogs and sleds form a very interest-
ing part of the Hud.son Bay outfit. One
does not need to go very deep into west-
ern Canada to meet with them. As close
to our centre of population as Nipigon,
on Lake Superior, tiie only roads into the
north are the rivers and lakes, traversed

l)y canoes in sumiiK'r and sleds in winter.
The doj^s ar<^ of a peculiar breed, and are
called huskies"' — uiuloubtediy a corrup-
tion of the word Esquimaux. They pre-
serve a closer resemldance to the wolf
than any of our domesticated dogs, and
exhibit their kinship with that scavenger
of the wilderness in their nature as well
as their looks. To-day their females, if
tied and left in the forest, will often at-
test companionship with its denizens by
bringing forth litters of wollish progeny,
^loreover. it will not be necessary to feed
all with whom the experiment is tried,
for the wolves will be apt to bring food
to them as long as they are thus neglected
by man. They are often as large as the
ordinary Newfoundland dog, but their
legs are shorter, and even more hairy,
and the hair along their necks, from their
shoulders to their skulls, stands erect in a
thick bristling ma.ss. They liave the long
.'•nouts, sharp-pointed ear.s, and the tails
of wolves, and their cry is a yelp rather
than a bark. Like wolves they are a])t
to yelj) in chorus at sunrise and at sun-
set. They delight in worrying peace-
ful animals, setting their own numbers
against one, and they will kill cows, or
even children, if they get the chance.
They are disciplined only when at work,
and are then so surprisingly ob(>dient,
tractable, and industrious as to i)lainly
show that though their nature is savage
and woHish, they could be reclaimed by
domestication. In isolated cases i)lenty of
them are. As it is, in their packs, their
battles among themselves are terrible, and
they are dangerous when loose. In some
districts it is the custom to tui-n them loose
in summer (Hi little islands in the lakes,
leaving them to hunger or feast accord-
ing as the supply of dead fish thrown
u])on the shore is small or iiientiful.
When they are kept in dog qua/ters they
are simply penned up and fed during the
summer, so that the savage sid^ of their
nature gets full play during long periods.
Fish is their principisl diet, and stores of
dried fish are kept for their winter food.
Corn meal is often fed to them also. Like
a wolf or an Indian, a "husky" gets
along without food when there is not any,
and will eat his own weight of it when it
is plenty.

A typical dog-sled is very like a tobog-
gan. It is formed of two thin pieces of
oak or birch lashed together with buck-
skin thongs and turned up high in front.

«,'

i t\

'TALKING MUSQUASH."

THE FACTOR S FANCY TOBOGGAN.

It is usually about nine foot in louutli by
sixteen iuclies \vi(l(>. A leallier cord is
run alono; the outer edges for fasteniuj.;'
wluitever may l)e jjut ui)()n tlie sled. Vary-
in<? numbers of do<^s are liaruessed to
such sleds, but the usual nuuiber is four.
Traces, collars, and backhands form the
harness, and the dog's are hitched one be-
fore the other. Very often the collars are
completed with sets of sleigh-bells, and
sometimes the harness is otherwi.se oriui-
mented with beads, tassels, fringes, or rib-
bons. The leader, or foregoer. is always
the best in the team. The dog next to
him is called the steady dog, and the last
is named the steer dog. As a rule, these
faithful animals are treated liarshly, if
not brutally. It is a Hudson Bay a.xiom
that i.o man who cannot cni'se in three
languages is lit to drive them. The three
profanities are.of course, Englisli, French,
and Indian, though whoever has heard
the Northwest French knows that it ought
to serve by itself, as it is lialf-soled with
Anglo-Saxon oaths and heeled with Ind-
ian obscenity. The rule with whoever
goes on St dog -sled journey is that the

driver, or mock - passenger, runs behind
the dogs. Tlie main function of the sled
is to carry the dead weight the burdens
of tent covers, blankets, food, and the like.
The men run along with or behind tin;
dogs, on snow-slioes, and wiien the dogs
make better time than liorses are able
to. and will carry between 200 and liOO
pounils over daily distances of from
twenty to thirty-five miles, according to
the condition of the ice or .snow, aiid
that many a journey of lOUO miles has
been performed in this way. and some of
2000 mih^s, the test of human endurance
is as great as that of canine grit.

]Men travelling " light," witli extra sleds
for the freight, and men on short journeys
often ride in the sleds, which in such cases
are titted up as '"caiuojes" for the i)ur-
pose. I have heai'd an unauthenticated
accovuit, by a Hudson Bay man, of men
who drove them.selves, disciplining re-
fractory or lazy dogs by simply ))ulling
them in beside or over the dash-board, and
holding them down by the neck while
they thraslied them. A story is told of a
worthy bishop who complained of tlie

506

llAUPERS NKW MONTHLY MAGAZINE.

slow ])i'orjr(>ss Ills sled was making, and fornianccs of (he drivers are tlic more

WHS told that it was useless to coiiiplaiii, woiideil'ul. It was a white youth, son of

as tlie doffs would not work unless tlioy u factor, who ran behind the hislutp's do^s

were roundly and inccNsantly <Mirsed. in the spurt of 4(t miles by daylij;ht that

HALT OF A YORK BOAT BKIGADE FOR THE NIGHT.

After a time the bislioj) jjave his driver
absolution for the ])rofanity needed for
the remainder of the Journey, and thence-
forth si)ed ovei- the snow at a gallop, every
stroke of the half-breed's long and cruel
whip being sent home Avith a volley of
wicked words, emphasized at times with
peltings with sharp -edged bits of ice.
Kane, the exi)l'>rer, made an average of
57 miles a day behind these shaggy little
brutes. Milton and Cheadle, in tlieir book,
mention instances where the dogs made
140 miles in less than 48 hours, and the
Bishop of Rupert's Land tokl me he had
covered 20 miles in a forenoon and zO in
the afternoon of the same day, without
causing his dogs to exhibit evidence of
fatigue. The best time is made on hard
snow and ice, of c(mrse, and when the
conditions suit, the drivers whip off their
snow-shoes to trot behind the dogs more
easily. In view of wliat they do, it is no
wonder that many of the Northern Ind-
ians, upon first seeing horses, named them
simply "big dog." But to me the per-

I mention. The men who do such work
ex))lain tliat the " ]o\)e " of the dogs is pe-
culiarly suited to the dog-trot of a human
being.

A ])icture of a factor on a round of his
outposts,or of a chief factor racing through
a great district, will now be intelligible.
If he is riding, he fancies that princes
and lords would envy him could they see
his luxurious comfort. Fancy him in a
dog-cai'iole of the best pattern — a little
suggestive of a burial casket, to be sui'e,
in its .sliape, but gaudily painted, and so
full of .soft warm furs that the man with-
in is enveloped like a chry.salis in a co-
coon. Perluips there are Russian bells
on the collars of the dogs, and their har-
ness is "Frenchified " witli bead-work and
tassels. The air, which fans only his face,
is crisj) and invigorating, and before 1 im
the lake or stream over which he rides is
a sheet of virgin snow — not nature's wind-
ing-si eet, as those who cannot love na-
ture have said, but rather a robe of beau-
tiful ermine fringed and embroidered with

WV'

"TALKING MUSQUASH."

S07

(lark evorffi'oon, and that in turn fleckocl
at every point with snow, as if bojowolled
witli pearls. If tho factor chats with his
driver, wlio falls betiind at rougli places
to keep tlie sled from tipping over, tlieir
conversation is carried on at so hiffh a
., tone as to startle the birds into flif^ht, if

-^v^ there are any, and to sliock the scene as

by the (greatest rndeness possi})le in tliat
then vast silent land. If silence is kept,
the factor reads the prints of game in
the snow, of foxes' pads and deer hoofs,
of wolf s))lotches, and tlie queer hiero-
glyphics of birds, or the dots and trong^hs
of rabbit-trailing. To him these are as
legible as the Morse alpliabet to telegra-
phers, and as important as stock quotations
to the pallid men of Wall Street.

Suddenly in the distance he sees a liu-
man figure. Time was that his prede-
cessors would have stopped to discuss the
situation and its dangers, for the sight
of one Indian suggested the presence of
moi'c, and the question came, were these
friendly or fierce ? But now the sled hur-
ries on. It is only an Indian or half-
• breed hunter minding his traps, of which
he may have a suflicient number to give
him a circuit of ten or more miles away
from and back to his lodge or village. He
is approached and hailed by the driver,
and with some pretty name very often —
one that may mean in English "hawk
flying across the sky when the sun is
setting," or "blazing sun," or whatever.
' On goes the sled, and perhaps a village
is the next object of interest; not a vil-
lage in our sense of the word, but now
and then a te[)ee or a hut peeping above
tho brush beside the water, the eye being
^ led to them by the signs of slothful dis-
, order close by — the rotting canoe frame,
the bones, the dirty tattered blankets, the
twig- formed skeleton of a steam bath, such
as Indians resort to when tired or sick or
uncommonly dirty, the worn-out snow-
shoes hung on a trQe, and tlie racks of
frozen flsh or di-icd meat here and there.
A dog rushes down to the water-side,
barking furiously — an Indian dog of the
currish type of paupers' dogs the world
around— and this stire the village pack,
and brings out the squaws, who are ad-
dressed, as the trapper up the stream was,
by some poetic names, albeit poetic license
is sometimes strained to form names not
at all pretty to polite senses, "All Stom-
ach" being that of one dusky princess,
and serving to indicate the lengths to
Vol. LXXXIV.— No. 502.-49

whicli poesy may lead tho untrammelled
mind.

The sun sinks early, and if our trav-
eller be journeying in the West and be
a lover of nature, heaven send that his
face be turned towar'l the sunset! Then,
be the sky anytliing but completely storm-
draped, he will see a sight so glorious
that eloquence becomes a naked suppli-
ant for alms beyond the gift of language
when set to describe it. A few clouds
are necessary to its i)erfection, ajul tlien
they take on celestial dyes, and one sees,
above the vanished sun, a blaze of golden
yellow thinned into a tone that is lumi-
nous crystal. This is flanked by belts and
breasts of salmon and ruby red, and all
melt toward the zenith into a rose tone
that l>as body at the base, but pales at
top into a mere blush. This I have seen
night after night on the lakes and the
plains and on the mountains. But as
the glory of it beckp^i** the traveller ever
toward itself, so the farther he follows,
the more brilliant and gaudy will be his
reward. Beyond the mountains the val-
leys and waters are more and more en-
riched, until, at the Pacific, even San
Francisco's shabby sand hills stir poetry
and reverence in the soul by their bor-
rowed magnificence.

The travellers soon stop to camp for
the night, and while the "breed" falls
to at the laborious but quick and simple
work, the factor either helps or smokes
his pipe. A sight-seer or sportsman would
have set his man to bobbing for jack-
fish or lake trout, or would have stopped
awhile to bag a partridge, or might have
bought whatever of this sort the trapper
or Indian village boasted, but, ten to one,
this meal would be of bacon and bread
or dried meat, and perhaps some flap-
jacks, such as would bring coin to a doc-
tor in the city, but which seem ethereal
and delicious in the wilderness, partic-
ularly if made half an inch thick, sat-
urated with grease, well browned, and
eaten while at the temperature and con-
sistency of molten lava.

The sled is pulled up by the bank, the
ground is cleared for a fire, wood and
brush are cut, and the deft laborer stai-ts
the flame in a tent-like pyramid of kin-
dlings no higher or broader than a tea-
cup. This tiny fire he spreads by adding
fuel until he has constructed and led up
to a conflagration of logs as thick as his
thighs, cleverly planned with a backlog

608

HART'KR'S NEW MONTHLY MA(iA/INK.

and plowing fire-bed, and a sapliiij,' l)ent
OVJT the liottost part to lioid a pt-iidont
kettle on its tip. The doj^rs will have
needed disciplitiiiip lonp before this, and
if tiie driver be like iimny of bis kind,
and works himself into a fury, he will
not liesitate to s(!ize one and send his
teetli togetlier throufifb its bide after he
has beaten it until he is tired. The point
of order liaving thus been raised and
carried, the sliajiffjfy, often liandsorne, ani-
mals will be minded to forget their ])ri-
vate grudges and quarrels, and, seated
on tlieir haunches, with their intelligent
faces toward the fire, will watch the
cooking intently. The pocket knives or
sheath knives of the men will be apt to
be the only table implement in use at the
meal. Canada had reached the possesrsion
of seigniorial mansions of great character
before any other knife was brought to
table, tliough the ladies used costly blades
set in precious .ind beautiful liandles.
To-day the axe ranks the knife in the
wilderness, but he who has a knife can
make and furnish his own table — and his
liouse also, for that matter.

Supper over, and a glass of grog having
been put down, with water from the hole
in the ice whence the liquid for the inev-
itable tea was gotten, the night's rest is
begun. The method for this varies. As
good men as ever walked have asked
nothing more cozy than a snug warm
trough in the snow and a blanket or a
robe; but perhaps this traveller will call
for a shake-down of balsam boughs, with
all the furs out of the sled for his cover-
ing. If nicer yet, he may order a low
hollow chamber of three sides of banked
snow, and a superstructure of crotched
sticks and cross-poles, with canvas thrown
over it. Every man to his quality, of
course, and that of the servant calls for
simply a blanket. With that lie sleeps
as soundly as if he were Santa Claus and
only stirred once a year. Then will fall
upon what seems the whole world the
mighty hush of the wilderness, broken
only occasionally by the hoot of an owl,
the cry of a wolf, the deep thug of the
straining ice on the lake, or the snoring
of the men and dogs. But if the earth
seems asleep, not so the sky. The magic
sliuttle of the aurora borealis is ofttimes
at work up over that North country, send-
ing its shifting lights weaving across the
firmament with a tremulous brilliancy
and energy we in this country get but

pale bints of when we see the phenome-
non at all. Flashing an 1 palpitating in-
cessantly, the rose-tinted waves and lu-
minous whit(> bars leap across the sky or
dart up and down it in manner so fan-
t^istic and so f<»r<'eful, even despit*! their
shadowy thinne.ss, that travellers have
fancied themselves deaf to some seraphic
sound that they believed such commotion
must produce.

An incident of this typical journey I
am describing would, at more than one
season, be a meeting willi some band of
Indians going to a post with furs for bar-
ter. Though the bulk of these hunters
fetch their quarry in the spring and
early summer, some may come at any
time. The procession may be f>nly that
of a family or of the two or more fam-
ilies that live together or as neighbors.
The man, if there is but one group, is cer-
tain to be stalking ahead, carrying no-
thing but his gun. Then come the wo-
men, laden like ])ack-horses. They may
have a sled packed with the furs and
drawn by a dog or two, and an extra dog
may bear a balanced load on his back,
but the squaw is certain to have a spine-
warping burden of meat and ;i battered
kettle and a pappoose, and whatever per-
sonal propert}' of any and every sort she
and her liege lord own. Children who
can walk have to do so, but it sometimes
happens that a baby a year and n half
or two years old is on her back, while a
new - born infant, swaddled in blanket
stuff, and bagged and tied like a Bologna
sausage, surmounts the load on the sled.
A more tatterdemalion outfit than a band
of these pauperized savages form it would
be difficult to imagine. On the plains
they will have horses dragging travoises,
dogs with travoises, women and children
loaded with impedimenta, a colt or two
running loose, the lordly mei' riding free,
straggling curs a plenty, babies in arms,
babies swaddled, an(J toddlers afoot, and
the whole battalion presenting at its ex-
posed points exhibits of torn blankets, raw
meat, distorted pots and pans, tent, poles,
and rusty traps, in all eloquently sugges-
tive of an eviction in the slums of a great
city.

I speak thus of these people not will-
ingly, but out of the necessity of truth-
telling. The Indian east of the Rocky
Mountains is to me the subject of an ad-
miration which is the stronger the more
nearly I find him as lie was in his prime.

. f

"TALKING MUSQUASH."

609

■

It is not Ills fuult that most of his mco
Iiave def^eiierated. It is nut uur fault tliat
wo have better UHes for tlie continent than
those to wliich he put it. But it i.s our
fault that ho i.s, as I have seen liiin, shiv-
ering in a cotton tepee full of lioles, and
turning around and around before a tire
of wet wood to keep from freezing to
death ; furnished meat if ho lias been lierce
enough to make us fear him, left to starve
if l»e has been docile; taught, ay, forced
to beg, mocked at by a religion he can-
not understand, from the mouths of men
who apparently will not understand him;
debauched with rum, de.spoilcd by the lust
of white men in every form that lust can
take. All, it is a sickening story. Not
in Canada, do you say? Why, in the
northern wilds of Canada are districts
peopled by beggars who have been in
such pitiful stress for food and covering
that tlie Hudson Bay Company has kept
them alive with advances of provisions
and blankets winter after winter. They
are Iiidiutis who in their strength never
gave the government the concern it now
fails to show for their weakness. The
great fur company has thus added gen-
erosity to its long career of just dealing
with these poor adult children; for it is a
fact tliat though the company has made
what profit it might, it has not, in a cen-
tury at least, cheated the Indians, or made
false representations to them, or lost their
good-will and respect by any feature of
its policy toward them. Its relation to
them lias been paternal, and they owe
none of their degradation to it.

I have spoken of the visits of the na-
tives to the posts. There are two other
arrivals of great consequence — the coming
of the supplies, and of the winter mail or
packet. I have seen the provisions and
trade goods being put up in bales in the
great mercantile storehouse of the com-
pany in Winnipeg — a .store like a combi-
nation of a Sixth Avenue ladies' bazar
and one of our wholesale grocer's shops —
and I liave seen such weights of canned
vegetables and canned plum-pudding and
bottled ale and other luxuries that I am
sure tliat in some posts there is good liv-
ing on high days and holidays if not al-
ways. The stores are packed in parcels
averaging sixty pounds (and sometimes
one hundred), to make them convenient
for handling on the portages—" for pack-
ing them over the carries," as our traders
used to say. It is in following these sup-

plies that we become most keenly sensible
of the changes time has wrought in the
metluxls of the company. Tlie day was,
away back in the era of the Northwest
Company, tliat the goods for the posts
w >nt up the Ottawa from Montreal in
great canoes manned by hardy voyageura
in picturesque costumes, wielding scarlet
paddles, and stirring the forests with their
hap|)y songs. The scene shifted, the com-
panies blended, and the centre of tlie
trade moved fnmi old Fort William, close
to where Port Arthur now is on Lake
Superior, up to Winnipeg, on the Red
River of the North. Then the Canadians
and their cousins, the half-breeds, more
picturesque than ever, and manning the
great York boats of the Hudson Bay
Company, swept in a long train through
Lake Winnipeg to Norway House, and
tlience by a marvellous water route all
the way to i.he Rockies and the Arctic,
sending off freight for side districts at
fixed points along the course. The main
factories on this line, maintained as such
for more than a century, bear names
whose very mention stirs the blood of
one who knows the romantic, picturesque,
and poetic history and atmosphere of the
old company when it was the landlord
(in part, and in part monopolist) of a ter-
ritory that cut into our Northwest and
Alaska, and swept from Labrador to Van-
couver Island. Northward and westward,
by waters emptying into Hudson Bay,
the brigade of great boats worked through
a region embroidered with sheets and
ways of water. The system that was
next entered, and which bore more nearly
due west, bends and bulges with lakes
and straits like a ribbon all curved and
knotted. Thus, at a great portage, the
divide was reached and crossed; and so
the waters flowing to the Arctic, and
one — the Peace River — rising beyond the
Rockies, wei'e met and travelled. This
was the way and the method until after
the Canadian Pacific Railway was built,
but now the Winnipeg route is of subor-
dinate importance, and feeds only the
region near the west side of Hudson Bay.
The Northern supplies now go by rail
from Calgai'y, in Alberta, over the plains
by the new Edmonton railroad. From
Edmonton the goods go by cart to Atha-
basca Landing, there to be laden on a
steamboat, which takes them nortliward
until some rapids are met, and avoided by
the u"e of a singular combination of ba-

BIO

HAU1»KR'S NKW MONTHLY MA(JAZ1NK.

toaiix and tramway ruils. AftiM- i^ hIow
projrn'SH of llftwii milt's anotiM>i- hU'ium
l)()!il JH in»'t, and thonct* lli«'y follWw tlic
Allial»Ui(*a, tlirou^li AthabuHca l^iko, and
8(> on up to a second rapidH, on the (jlr(>at
Hluve liivcr this time, wlienj oxiMi and
cart« carry thcin acroHS a sixtticn mile
portajfc to li Bcn'W HU-anicr, wliicli liniHh«iH
tli« tlinM'-tliou»and-rnile journey to the
North. Of course the shorter brancli
route's, diHtributint; the }jfoo<lH on either
side of tiie main track, are still traversed
by can<Hi8 and liardy fellows in th(^ old
way, but with shabby accessoritis of cos-
tume and spirit. These boatmen, when
they come it) a porUijfe, produce their
tomplines, and "pack" the floods to the
next waterway. By means of these
" lines" tliey carry great weiglits, resting
on tlieir backs, but supported from their
skulls, over whic)i the strong straps are
passed.

The winter mail-packet, startiiifj from
Winnipeg in the depth of tlie season, jjoes
to nil the posts by dofj train. The letters
and pHi)ers are packed in great boxes and
strapped to the sleds, beside or behind

which the drivers trot along, cra<'king
their lashes and pelting and cursing tl>e
dogs. A more direct (bourse tluin the old
Lake Winnipeg wuy has usually been
followed by this packet; but it is thought
that the route riVt Edmonton and Ath-
abasca Ijanding will serve belter yet, so
that another chang( may btt nuide. This
°'t a snuill exhibition as compared with
liie brigade that Uikes the snp))lies, or
those others that come plashing down
the streams and across the country with
the furs every year. But only fancy
how eagerly tliis solitary semianntnil mail
is waited fori It is a little speck on the
snow;wrai)ped upper end of all North
Amcirica. It cut« a tiny trail, and liere
and there lesser black dots move oH' from
it to cut still slenderer threads, zigzagging
to the side factories and les.ser ))osts; but
we may be sure that if human eyes could
see so far, all those of the white men in
all that vast tangled system of trading
centres would be watching the little ciir-
avan, until at last each pair fell upon the
expected missives from the throbbing
world this side of the border.

PERjiO^AL RECOLLECTIONS OF NATHANIEL llAWTliOKNE.

BY HORATIO HUIDGK.

CtjUi) l&aptt.

nio liore, though thoy are not above a <iuniter
part what soiiio ])Ooplc Hiip])oso tliotn.

It HJckciiH nio to look back to Anurica. I
am Hick to deatli of the continual fuss and
tunuiU and oxciteniont and bad blood wliicli
we keep up about political topics. If it were
not for my childrei\ I should probably never
return, but — after quitting oflBco — sliouUl go
taly, and live and (lie tiicre. If Mrs. bridge
and\ou would go too, wc might iurm a little
colour amongst ourselves, and see our cliildren
grow/up together-, liut it will never do to de-
priva tliem of their native land, which I hope
willLe a more comfortable and hai»i)y residence
in tJieir day than it has been in ours. In my
opiiiion, we are the most nnseraltle people on
earth.

wish you would send me the most mintite

tii-

JMMEpIATEL^^fter Gen era]/ Pierce's
e\Gci^nnJ/»^e Presidency, in 1852, he
offered Hawthorne the Liverp/ol consul-
ate, an office then considerafl the most
lucrative of all the foreign dp])ointments
in the Presidential gift, andysoon after his
inauguration he gave liimAliat place.

In July, 1853, Hawthori/e and his
ly sailed for England.

A few of his letters dtc&^'ttere given,
which speak of some of his annoyances
at the prospect of his official emoluments
being decreased by legislation, and of
some other matters of public and private
concern.

LivKiiPOOL, March 30, 1854.

My dkar Bridgk, — You are welcome home,
and I heartily wish I could see Mrs. Bridge
and yourself and little Marian by our English
fireside.

I like my office well enough, but any official
duties and obligations are irksome to me be-
yond expression. Nevertheless, the emolu-
ments will be a sufficient inducement to keep

particulars

b^iavcH whe,

anH^sjur

really tin

terly unable to get at

Give him my best reg;

er he finds his post an

I prophesied it wonldjbe

I have a great dea^^mo;
it to future letters. MfsT

CO — how he looks and
t him, how his litalMi
ve all what the public
point which I am ut-
irough the newsjiapers.
ds, and ask him wheth-
more comfortable than

to f ay, but defer
awthi irne sends her

/*"