Trapping--The Fur-Bearing Animals--Value of different Furs--The
Trapper’s Start into the Forest--How to make a Marten Trap--
Steel Traps for Wolves and Foxes--The Wolverine--The Way he
gets a Living--His Destructiveness and Persecution of the
Trapper--His Cunning--His Behaviour when caught in a Trap--
La Ronde’s Stories of the Carcajou--The Trapper’s Life--The
Vast Forest in Winter--Sleeping Out--The Walk--Indians and
Half-breeds--Their Instinct in the Woods--The Wolverine
Demolishes our Traps--Attempts to Poison him--Treemiss’s
Arrival--He relates his Adventures--A Scrimmage in the Dark--
The Giant Tamboot--His Fight with Atahk-akoohp--Prowess of
Tamboot--Decide to send our Men to Red River for Supplies--
Delays.
The supply of meat which we had obtained being sufficient for some
time, we stored it up on the platform out of doors, to be preserved
by the frost, and turned our attention to trapping in the woods. Our
attempts had hitherto been confined to setting a few small steel traps
round the lake, and placing poisoned baits for the wolves. But we were
now desirous to fly at higher game, and, far in the depths of the
vast pine forest, seek trophies sure to be gratefully received when
presented to dear friends of the fair sex at home. The animals which
furnish the valuable furs from this region are the silver and cross
foxes, the fisher, marten, otter, mink, and lynx--whilst amongst
those of less worth are the wolverine, beaver, ermine, and musk-rat.
The beaver was formerly found in great numbers, and its peltry highly
prized; but from the assiduity with which it was hunted, it has now
become comparatively scarce; and from the substitution of silk for
beaver skin in the manufacture of hats, the latter has become almost
worthless. Of all furs, with the single exception of the sea-otter,
which is found only on the Pacific coast, the silver fox commands the
highest price. The fur of the silver fox is of a beautiful grey; the
white hairs, which predominate, being tipped with black, and mixed
with others of pure black. A well-matched pair of silver fox skins
are worth from £80 to £100. The cross foxes, so called from the dark
stripe down the back, with a cross over the shoulders like that on a
donkey, vary in every degree between the silver and the common red fox;
and the value of their skins varies in the same ratio. After the best
cross foxes come the fisher, the marten, and the mink. These three are
all animals of the pole-cat tribe, and both in size and value may be
classed in the order in which they have been mentioned. The skin of a
fisher fetches from sixteen shillings to thirty shillings; a marten,
fifteen shillings to twenty-three shillings; and a mink, from ten
shillings to fifteen shillings. The otter, which is less common than
the two last named, commands a price of one shilling an inch, measured
from the head to the tip of the tail. The ermine is exceedingly common
in the forests of the North-West, and is a nuisance to the trapper,
destroying the baits set for the marten and fisher. It is generally
considered of too little value to be the object of the trapper’s
pursuit. The black bear is also occasionally discovered in his winter’s
hole, and his skin is worth about forty shillings. The lynx is by no
means uncommon, and generally taken by snares of hide. When caught,
he remains passive and helpless, and is easily knocked on the head
by the hunter. The other denizens of the forests are the moose, and
smaller game, such as the common wood partridge, or willow grouse, the
pine partridge, the rabbit, and the squirrel. By far the most numerous
of the more valuable fur animals in this region are the marten and
the mink, and to the capture of the former of these two--the sable
of English furriers--the exertions of the trapper are principally
directed. At the beginning of November, when the animals have got
their winter coats, and fur is “in season,” the trapper prepares his
pack, which he makes in the following manner:--Folding his blanket
double, he places in it a lump of pemmican, sufficient for five or
six days’ consumption, a tin kettle and cup, and, if he is rich, some
steel traps, and a little tea and salt. The blanket is then tied at
the four corners, and slung on the back by a band across the chest. A
gun and ammunition, axe, knife, and fire-bag, complete his equipment.
Tying on a pair of snow-shoes, he starts alone into the gloomy woods--
trudging silently forward--for the hunter or trapper can never lighten
the solitude of his journey by whistling or a song. His keen eye scans
every mark upon the snow for the tracks he seeks. When he observes
the footprints of marten or fisher, he unslings his pack, and sets to
work to construct a “dead fall,” or wooden trap, after the following
manner. Having cut down a number of saplings, these are divided into
stakes of about a yard in length, which are driven into the ground so
as to form a palisade, in the shape of half an oval, cut transversely.
Across the entrance to this little enclosure, which is of a length to
admit about two-thirds of the animal’s body, and too narrow to admit
of its fairly entering in and turning round, a short log is laid. A
tree of considerable size is next felled, denuded of its branches,
and so laid that it rests upon the log at the entrance in a parallel
direction. The bait, which is generally a bit of tough dried meat, or
a piece of a partridge or squirrel, is placed on the point of a short
stick. This is projected horizontally into the enclosure, and on the
external end of it rests another short stick, placed perpendicularly,
which supports the large tree laid across the entrance. The top of the
trap is then covered in with bark and branches, so that the only means
of access to the bait is by the opening between the propped-up tree and
the log beneath. When the bait is seized, the tree falls down upon the
animal and crushes him to death. An expert trapper will make forty or
fifty traps in a single day.
[Illustration: A MARTEN TRAP.
(_See page 102._)
]
The steel traps resemble our ordinary rat-traps, but have no teeth, and
the springs are double. In the large traps used for beavers, foxes,
and wolves, these have to be made so powerful that it requires all
the force of a strong man to set them. They are placed in the snow,
and carefully covered over; fragments of meat are scattered about,
and the place smoothed down, so as to leave no trace. To the trap is
attached a chain, with a ring at the free extremity, through which a
stout stake is passed, and left otherwise unattached. When an animal is
caught--generally by the leg, as he digs in the snow for the hidden
morsels--he carries off the trap for a short distance, but is soon
brought up by the stake getting entangled across the trees and fallen
timber, and is rarely able to travel any great distance before being
discovered by the trapper.
The fur-hunter’s greatest enemy is the North American glutton, or, as
he is commonly called, the wolverine or carcajou. This curious animal
is rather larger than an English fox, with a long body, stoutly and
compactly made, mounted on exceedingly short legs of great strength.
His broad feet are armed with powerful claws, and his track in the snow
is as large as the print of a man’s fist. The shape of his head, and
his hairy coat, give him very much the appearance of a shaggy brown dog.
During the winter months he obtains a livelihood by availing himself of
the labours of the trapper, and such serious injury does he inflict,
that he has received from the Indians the name of Kekwaharkess, or “The
Evil One.” With untiring perseverance he hunts day and night for the
trail of man, and when it is found follows it unerringly. When he comes
to a lake, where the track is generally drifted over, he continues
his untiring gallop round its borders, to discover the point at which
it again enters the woods, and again follows it until he arrives at
one of the wooden traps. Avoiding the door, he speedily tears open an
entrance at the back, and seizes the bait with impunity; or if the trap
contains an animal, he drags it out, and, with wanton malevolence,
mauls it and hides it at some distance in the underwood, or at the
top of some lofty pine. Occasionally, when hard pressed by hunger, he
devours it. In this manner he demolishes the whole series of traps,
and when once a wolverine has established himself on a trapping-walk,
the hunter’s only chance for success is to change ground, and build a
fresh lot of traps, trusting to secure a few furs before the new path
is found out by his industrious enemy.
Strange stories are related by the trappers of the extraordinary
cunning of this animal, which they believe to possess a wisdom almost
human. He is never caught by the ordinary “dead fall.” Occasionally one
is poisoned, or caught in a steel trap; but his strength is so great,
that many traps strong enough to hold securely a large wolf will not
retain the wolverine. When caught in this way, he does not, like the
fox and the mink, proceed to amputate the limb, but, assisting to carry
the trap with his mouth, makes all haste to reach a lake or river,
where he can hasten forward at speed, unobstructed by trees and fallen
wood. After travelling far enough to be tolerably safe from pursuit
for a time, he devotes himself to the extrication of the imprisoned
limb, in which he not unfrequently succeeds. The wolverine is also
sometimes killed by a gun, placed bearing on a bait, to which is
attached a string communicating with the trigger. La Ronde assured us
most solemnly that on several occasions the carcajou had been far too
cunning for him, first approaching the gun and gnawing in two the cord
communicating with the trigger, and then securely devouring the bait.
In one instance, when every device to deceive his persecutor had
been at once seen through, and utterly futile, he adopted the plan
of placing the gun in a tree, with the muzzle pointing vertically
downwards upon the bait. This was suspended from a branch, at such a
height that the animal could not reach it without jumping. The gun
was fastened high up in the tree, completely screened from view by
the branches. Now, the wolverine is an animal troubled with exceeding
curiosity. He investigates everything; an old moccasin thrown aside
in the bushes, or a knife lost in the snow, are ferreted out and
examined, and anything suspended almost out of reach generally offers
an irresistible temptation. But in the case related by La Ronde the
carcajou restrained his curiosity and hunger for the time, climbed the
tree, cut the cords which bound the gun, which thus tumbled harmless
to the ground, and then, descending, secured the bait without danger.
Poison and all kinds of traps having already failed, La Ronde was
fairly beaten and driven off the ground.
For the truth of this particular story we, of course, do not pretend
to vouch, but would merely observe that our own subsequent experience
fully proved the wolverine to be an animal of wonderful sagacity
and resource; and that, supposing the gun to have been set, and
afterwards found cut down as related, there is little doubt that La
Ronde interpreted the mode of procedure with perfect correctness. An
Indian or half-breed reads the signs left behind as easily and truly as
if he had been present and witnessed the whole transaction. In other
instances, where we have had ample opportunities of judging, we never
detected a mistake in their reading of the language of tracks--marks
left printed on that book the hunter reads so well, the face of Nature.
Until nearly the end of December we employed ourselves by accompanying
La Ronde on his trapping expeditions. We thus could distinguish the
track of every animal found in the forest, and learnt much of their
habits and peculiarities. Cheadle was especially fascinated by this
branch of the hunter’s craft, and pursued it with such diligence and
success, that he was very soon able to make a trap and set it almost as
quickly and skilfully as his accomplished preceptor, La Ronde. There is
something strangely attractive in the life, in spite of the hardships
and fatigues which attend it. The long, laborious march, loaded with
a heavy pack, and cumbered with a quantity of thick clothing, through
snow and woods beset with fallen timber and underwood, is fatiguing
enough. The only change is the work of making the traps, or the rest at
night in camp. Provisions usually fall short, and the trapper subsists,
in great measure, upon the flesh of the animals captured to obtain the
fur. But, on the other hand, the grand beauty of the forest, whose
pines, some of which tower up above 200 feet in height, are decked and
wreathed with snow, and where no sound is heard, except the occasional
chirrup of a squirrel, or the explosions of trees cracking with intense
frost, excites admiration and stimulates curiosity. The intense
stillness and solitude, the travelling day after day through endless
woods without meeting a sign of man, and rarely _seeing_ a living
creature, strikes very strangely on the mind at first. The half-breed
trapper delights in wandering alone in the forest; but Cheadle, who
tried the experiment for two days, found the silence and loneliness so
oppressive as to be quite unbearable.
The interest in the pursuit was constantly kept up by the observation
of tracks, the interpretation of their varied stories, and the account
of the different habits of the animals as related by our companion.
There is also no small amount of excitement in visiting the traps
previously made, to see whether they contain the looked-for prize,
or whether all the fruits of hard labour have been destroyed by the
vicious wolverine.
At night, lying on a soft, elastic couch of pine boughs, at his feet a
roaring fire of great trees heaped high, from which rises an enormous
column of smoke and steam from the melted snow, the trapper, rolled up
in his blanket, sleeps in peace. Sometimes, however, when the cold is
very intense, or the wind blows strongly, a single blanket is but poor
protection. The huge fire is inadequate to prevent the freezing of one
extremity, while it scorches the other, and sleep is impossible, or, if
obtained, quickly broken by an aching cold in every limb as the fire
burns low. On these winter nights the Northern Lights were often very
beautiful. Once or twice we observed them in the form of a complete
arch, like a rainbow of roseate hues, from which the changing, fitful
gleams streamed up to meet at the zenith.
After we had been out a day or two, our provisions generally came
to an end, and we lived on partridges and the animals we trapped.
As soon as the skins of the martens and fishers were removed, their
bodies were stuck on the end of a stick, and put to roast before the
fire, looking like so many skewered cats. These animals not only smell
uncommonly like a ferret, but their flesh is of an intensely strong and
disgusting flavour, exactly corresponding to the odour, so that a very
strong stomach and good appetite is required to face such a meal. The
trapper’s camp in the woods is always attended by the little blue and
white magpie, who, perched on a bough close by, waits for his portion
of scraps from the meal. These birds invariably “turn up” immediately
after camp is made, and are so tame and bold that they will even steal
the meat out of the cooking-pot standing by the fire.
The snow was at this time not more than eight inches deep, and we
did not as yet use snow-shoes in the woods, where the brushwood and
fallen timber rendered them somewhat awkward encumbrances. But the
walking was consequently very fatiguing, and we reached home, after
five or six days’ absence, invariably very much wearied and jaded. On
these excursions we were much struck, amongst other things, with the
great difference between the walk of an Indian or half-breed and our
own. We had before observed that, when apparently sauntering quietly
along, they went past us with the greatest ease, even when we flattered
ourselves we were going at a very respectable pace. This was now, in a
great measure, explained. In walking in the snow, in Indian file, we
observed La Ronde’s great length of stride; and Cheadle, in particular,
who prided himself upon his walking powers, was much chagrined to find
that he could not tread in La Ronde’s footsteps without springing from
one to the next. Afterwards he discovered that his longest stride was
only just equal to that of the little Misquapamayoo!
The superiority of the Indian in this respect doubtless results from
the habitual use of moccasins, which allow full play to the elastic
bend of the foot. This is impeded by the stiff sole of an ordinary
boot. The muscles of an Indian’s foot are so developed, that it appears
plump and chubby as that of a child. Misquapamayoo continually derided
the scraggy appearance of our pedal extremities, and declared there
must be something very faulty in their original construction.
The unerring fidelity with which our guide followed a straight course
in one direction in the dense forest, where no landmarks could be seen,
in days when the sun was not visible, nor a breath of air stirring,
seemed to us almost incomprehensible. La Ronde was unable to explain
the power which he possessed, and considered it as quite a natural
faculty. Cheadle, on the other hand, found it quite impossible to
preserve a straight course, and invariably began to describe a circle,
by bearing continually towards the left; and this weakness was quite
incomprehensible to La Ronde, who looked upon it as the most arrant
stupidity.
Hitherto no wolverine had annoyed us, and we succeeded in accumulating
a nice collection of furs. But at last, when starting to visit our
walk, we observed the tracks of one of very large size, which had
followed our trail, and La Ronde at once declared, “C’est fini,
monsieur; il a cassé toutes notres etrappes, vous allez voir;” and sure
enough, as we came to each in succession, we found it broken open at
the back, the bait taken, and, where an animal had been caught, it was
carried off. Throughout the whole line every one had been demolished,
and we discovered the tails of no less than ten martens, the bodies
of which had apparently been devoured by the hungry and successful
carcajou.
We had on a former occasion suspended small poisoned baits, wrapped in
old moccasins or other covering, on the bushes at different points. One
of these the wolverine had pulled down, unwrapped it, and bitten the
bait in two. Terrified at the discovery that it was poisoned, he had
rushed away at full speed from the dangerous temptation. It was useless
to set the traps again, and we thereupon returned home disconsolate, La
Ronde cursing, with all his might, “le sacré carcajou.”
One day the crows, which always announced the presence of any one
on the lake by a tremendous cawing, gave their usual signal of an
arrival. Going out on to the lake, we saw several sleighs advancing
across it, the bells on the harness jingling merrily in the frosty air,
as the dogs galloped along. Our visitors proved to be Treemiss and a
party from the Fort, on a trading expedition amongst the Wood Crees.
Treemiss had met with various adventures since we had last seen
him, and in one instance was in some danger of losing his life.
Atahk-akoohp, the hunter, came one evening, with several others, into
his hut, all half drunk, and importuned him to trade for furs. Vexed by
Treemiss’s refusal to do so, he threw a marten-skin violently into his
face. Irritated by the insult, Treemiss struck him with his fist. In an
instant all was uproar and confusion; knives flashed out, the candle
was kicked over and extinguished, and all were groping and stabbing at
Treemiss in the dark. Summarily upsetting an Indian who opposed his
passage, he made for his gun, which lay near the door, seized it, and
made good his escape outside, not, however, before receiving several
slight cuts and stabs through his clothes.
He waited, gun in hand, ready for his assailants, listening
with anxiety to a terrible commotion which was going on inside.
Atahk-akoohp, the aggressor, a man of lofty stature and powerful build,
he knew to be savage in the extreme when aroused. But he had a friend
within. He had shown much kindness to a half-breed named Tamboot, a
man of still more gigantic build and strength than Atahk-akoohp, and
this fellow now stepped forth in his might as the champion of his
friend. Seizing the huge form of Atahk-akoohp, he raised him in his
arms like a child, and dashed him on the floor with such violence,
that he lay almost senseless, and was so much injured that for above
a week afterwards he was unable to leave his bed; then, declaring he
would serve each in turn in the same manner, if they offered to lay
a hand on his benefactor, he made the rest sullenly retire. Tamboot
had previously killed two of his enemies by sheer exertion of force,
without using a weapon; and his reputation for courage and strength
stood so high, that none dared to interfere, and thus peace was once
more restored.
Our stock of flour and tea having by this time become exceedingly low,
and as but a small quantity of the latter only could be obtained at
Carlton, we decided to send the men back to Red River for a supply of
these necessaries, required for our journey forwards in the spring.
We accordingly engaged the Indian hunter, Keenamontiayoo, and his
boy, Misquapamayoo, to assist us in hunting, and perform any services
we might require during their absence. Some delay, however, occurred
before this plan could be put into execution, owing to the illness of
La Ronde. During this time we were all detained at home, and the days
passed by in somewhat dreary monotony.