Summer transport--Voyageurs--Norway House--The meeting place of many
brigades--Missionary work intensified.
As the summer months are few in that northern climate, the need to
push transport matter is imperative.
Norway House was the first depot post in the interior, coming from
York Factory on the Hudson's Bay. Here were wintered the most of the
"green hands," those men who had been brought out by the ship the
previous summer, and from this point these men were distributed to
the various districts in the farther interior.
To Norway House, in the early summer, came the brigade of boats from
the Mackenzie River, the Athabasca, and English River, and Cumberland
districts.
Down from the west, the Saskatchewan and Swan River districts, came
the "Braroes" (I give the word as it was pronounced), the men from
the great plains. Down from the south, the Red River Brigade added
their quota to these fleets of inland transport.
For all these Norway House was the common centre. At those times the
old fort was _en fete_. The river banks were lined far up and down
with boats and tents. The smoke of many campfires hung over the
place. The prattle of many tongues in different languages was heard.
English and French, and Norwegian and Ojibway, or Salteaux, and
Chippewayan, and Caughnawaga and Cree--these were most common at
these gatherings, but through and over all the Cree dominated and was
most generally understood and spoken.
Here were the Governor and chief factors and chief traders and clerks
of various grades in the service of this honorable Company. Here
were the steersmen and bowsmen and middlemen, the hardy voyageurs
whose strength of brain and muscle, and whose wonderful pluck and
daring, as well as prudence, made possible the import and export
traffic in vast regions which would have seemed to other men
impossible and inaccessible. Some of these men would leave their
distant inland posts on snow-shoes, and reaching what was the
frontier post to them in their sublime isolation, would then take to
the boats with the first break of navigation; then, descending rivers
and running rapids and portaging falls, they would finally reach York
Factory, and unloading and reloading, would turn and retrace their
course, and only arrive at the frontier post of their own district at
the beginning of winter. Then with snow-shoes and dog-train they
would travel to their own homes. The toil and hardship of such a
life is beyond the conception of most minds, and yet these men
endured all this uncomplainingly and without a murmur, in their
loyalty to the honorable Company they served.
What an object-lesson they were and have been to me!
These gatherings were periods of great responsibilities and also of
intense anxiety to the missionary stationed at Norway House.
These were the days of temptation to the people. Rum and evil
association were rife during these days.
Then there came within the range of his influence men who had seldom
been at service and many who had not had the opportunity of attending
a regular preaching service for a long time. To say the right word
to those who in a few days would scatter, who in a few weeks would be
located at widely distant posts, but who now gathered in the mission
church and eagerly listened to the preached Gospel--truly this was a
great responsibility for the missionary.
Then the men of our own mission would now be starting with their
brigade of boats for the summer's transport work. To counsel with
these, to arrange the work of the class-leader and local preacher, to
readmonish as to Sabbath observance and general deportment--all this
kept the missionary busy and anxious.
Father was instant in season and out of it. Both among Indians and
white men, his influence was very apparent and became widespread in
its effect for good.