"It was about the beginning of winter," said he, "that I set off on
snow-shoes, accompanied by an Indian, to a small lake to fetch fish
caught in the autumn, and which then lay frozen in a little house built
of logs, to protect them for winter use. The lake was about ten miles
off; and as the road was pretty level and not much covered with
underwood, we took a train of dogs with us, and set off before daybreak,
intending to return again before dark; and as the day was clear and
cold, we went cheerily along without interruption, except an occasional
fall when a branch caught our snow-shoes, or a stoppage to clear the
traces when the dogs got entangled among the trees. We had proceeded
about six miles, and the first grey streaks of day lit up the eastern
horizon, when the Indian who walked in advance paused, and appeared to
examine some footprints in the snow. After a few minutes of close
observation he rose, and said that a bear had passed not long before,
and could not be far off, and asked permission to follow it. I told him
he might do so, and said I would drive the dogs in his track, as the
bear had gone in the direction of the fish-house. The Indian threw his
gun over his shoulder, and was soon lost in the forest. For a quarter
of an hour I plodded on behind the dogs, now urging them along, as they
flagged and panted in the deep snow, and occasionally listening for a
shot from my Indian's gun. At last he fired, and almost immediately
after fired again; for you must know that some Indians can load so fast
that two shots from their single barrel sound almost like the discharge
in succession of the two shots from a double-barrelled gun. Shortly
after, I heard another shot; and then, as all became silent, I concluded
he had killed the bear, and that I should soon find him cutting it up.
Just as I thought this, a fierce growl alarmed me; so, seizing a pistol
which I always carried with me, I hastened forward. As I came nearer, I
heard a man's voice mingled with the growls of a bear; and upon arriving
at the foot of a small mound, my Indian's voice, apostrophising death,
became distinctly audible. `Come, Death!' said he, in a contemptuous
tone; `you have got me at last, but the Indian does not fear you!' A
loud angry growl from the bear, as he saw me rushing up the hill,
stopped him; and the unfortunate man turned his eyes upon me with an
imploring look. He was lying on his back, while the bear (a black one)
stood over him, holding one of his arms in its mouth. In rushing up the
mound I unfortunately stumbled, and filled my pistol with snow; so that
when the bear left the Indian and rushed towards me it missed fire, and
I had only left me the poor, almost hopeless, chance, of stunning the
savage animal with a blow of the butt-end. Just as he was rearing on
his hind legs, my eye fell upon the Indian's axe, which fortunately lay
at my feet; and seizing it, I brought it down with all my strength on
the bear's head, just at the moment that he fell upon me, and we rolled
down the hill together. Upon recovering myself, I found that the blow
of the axe had killed him instantly, and that I was uninjured. Not so
the Indian: the whole calf of his left leg was bitten off, and his body
lacerated dreadfully in various places. He was quite sensible, however,
though very faint, and spoke to me when I stooped to examine his wounds.
In a short time I had tied them up; and placing him on the sledge with
part of the bear's carcass, which I intended to dine upon, we returned
immediately to the fort. The poor Indian got better slowly, but he
never recovered the perfect use of his leg, and now hobbles about the
fort, cutting firewood, or paddling about the lake in search of ducks
and geese in his bark canoe."
Mr Cumming concluded his story just as we arrived at the little bay, at
the edge of which the Indian village of Rossville is built. From the
spot where we stood the body of the village did not appear to much
advantage; but the parsonage and church, which stood on a small mound,
their white walls in strong contrast to the background of dark trees,
had a fine picturesque effect. There were about twenty houses in the
village, inhabited entirely by Indians, most of whom were young and
middle-aged men. They spend their time in farming during the summer,
and are successful in raising potatoes and a few other vegetables for
their own use. In winter they go into the woods to hunt fur-bearing
animals, and also deer; but they never remain long absent from their
homes. Mr Evans resided among them, and taught them and their children
writing and arithmetic, besides instructing them in the principles of
Christianity. They often assembled in the school-house for prayer and
sacred music, and attended divine service regularly in the church every
Sunday. Mr Evans, who was a good musician, had taught them to sing in
parts; and it has a wonderfully pleasing effect upon a stranger to hear
these dingy sons and daughters of the wilderness raising their melodious
voices in harmony in praise of the Christian's God.
Upon our arrival at the village, we were ushered into Mr Evans' neat
cottage, from the windows of which is a fine view of Playgreen Lake,
studded with small islands, stretching out to the horizon on the right,
and a boundless wilderness of trees on the left. Here were collected
the ladies and gentlemen of Norway House, and a number of indescribable
personages, apparently engaged in mystic preparations for the
approaching feast. It was with something like awe that I entered the
schoolroom, and beheld two long rows of tables covered with puddings,
pies, tarts, stews, hashes, and vegetables of all shapes, sizes, and
descriptions, smoking thereon. I feared for the Indians, although they
can stand a great deal in the way of repletion; moderation being, of
course, out of the question, with such abundance of good things placed
before them. A large shell was sounded after the manner of a bugle, and
all the Indians of the village walked into the room and seated
themselves, the women on one side of the long tables, and the men on the
other. Mr Evans stood at the head, and asked a blessing; and then
commenced a work of demolition, the like of which has not been seen
since the foundation of the world! The pies had strong crusts, but the
knives were stronger; the paste was hard and the interior tough, but
Indian teeth were harder and Indian jaws tougher; the dishes were
gigantic, but the stomachs were capacious, so that ere long numerous
skeletons and empty dishes alone graced the board. One old woman, of a
dark-brown complexion, with glittering black eyes and awfully long
teeth, set up in the wholesale line, and demolished the viands so
rapidly, that those who sat beside her, fearing a dearth in the land,
began to look angry. Fortunately, however, she gave in suddenly, while
in the middle of a venison pasty, and reclining languidly backward, with
a sweetly contented expression of countenance, while her breath came
thickly through her half-opened mouth, she gently fell asleep--and
thereby, much to her chagrin, lost the tea and cakes which were served
out soon afterwards by way of dessert. When the seniors had finished,
the juveniles were admitted _en masse_, and they soon cleared away the
remnants of the dinner.
The dress of the Indians upon this occasion was generally blue cloth
capotes with hoods, scarlet or blue cloth leggins, quill-worked
moccasins, and no caps. Some of them were dressed very funnily; and one
or two of the oldest appeared in blue surtouts, which were very ill
made, and much too large for the wearers. The ladies had short gowns
without plaits, cloth leggins of various colours highly ornamented with
beads, cotton handkerchiefs on their necks, and sometimes also on their
heads. The boys and girls were just their seniors in miniature.
After the youngsters had finished dinner, the schoolroom was cleared by
the guests; benches were ranged along the entire room, excepting the
upper end, where a table, with two large candlesticks at either end,
served as a stage for the young actors. When all was arranged, the
elder Indians seated themselves on the benches, while the boys and girls
ranged themselves along the wall behind the table. Mr Evans then began
by causing a little boy about four years old to recite a long comical
piece of prose in English. Having been well drilled for weeks
beforehand, he did it in the most laughable style. Then came forward
four little girls, who kept up an animated philosophical discussion as
to the difference of the days in the moon and on the earth. Then a
bigger boy made a long speech in the Seauteaux language, at which the
Indians laughed immensely, and with which the white people present (who
did not understand a word of it) appeared to be greatly delighted, and
laughed loudly too. Then the whole of the little band, upon a sign
being given by Mr Evans, burst at once into a really beautiful hymn,
which was quite unexpected, and consequently all the more gratifying.
This concluded the examination, if I may so call it; and after a short
prayer the Indians departed to their homes, highly delighted with their
entertainment. Such was the Christmas feast at Rossville, and many a
laugh it afforded us that night as we returned home across the frozen
lake by the pale moonlight.
Norway House is perhaps one of the best posts in the Indian country.
The climate is dry and salubrious; and although (like nearly all the
other parts of the country) extremely cold in winter, it is very
different from the damp, chilling cold of that season in Great Britain.
The country around is swampy and rocky, and covered with dense forests.
Many of the Company's posts are but ill provided with the necessaries of
life, and entirely destitute of luxuries. Norway house, however, is
favoured in this respect. We always had fresh meat of some kind or
other; sometimes beef, mutton, or venison, and occasionally buffalo
meat, was sent us from the Swan River district. Of tea, sugar, butter,
and bread we had more than enough; and besides the produce of our garden
in the way of vegetables, the river and lake contributed white-fish,
sturgeon, and pike, or jack-fish, in abundance. The pike is not a
delicate fish, and the sturgeon is extremely coarse, but the white-fish
is the most delicate and delicious I ever ate. I am not aware of their
existence in any part of the Old World, but the North American lakes
abound with them. It is generally the size of a good salmon trout, of a
bright silvery colour, and tastes a little like salmon. Many hundreds
of fur-traders live almost entirely on white-fish, particularly at those
far northern posts where flour, sugar, and tea cannot be had in great
quantities, and where deer are scarce. At these posts the Indians are
sometimes reduced to cannibalism, and the Company's people have, on more
than one occasion, been obliged to eat their beaver-skins! The
beaver-skin is thick and oily, so that, when the fur is burned off, and
the skin well boiled, it makes a kind of soup that will at least keep
one alive. Starvation is quite common among the Indians of those
distant regions; and the scraped rocks, divested of their covering of
_tripe-de-roche_ (which resembles dried-up seaweed), have a sad meaning
and melancholy appearance to the traveller who journeys through the
wilds and solitudes of Rupert's Land.
Norway House is also an agreeable and interesting place, from its being
in a manner the gate to the only route to Hudson Bay, so that during the
spring and summer months all the brigades of boats and canoes from every
part of the northern department must necessarily pass it on their way to
York Factory with furs: and as they all return in the autumn, and some
of the gentlemen leave their wives and families for a few weeks till
they return to the interior, it is at this sunny season of the year
quite gay and bustling; and the clerks' house, in which I lived, was
often filled with a strange and noisy collection of human beings, who
rested here a while ere they started for the shores of Hudson Bay, for
the distant region of Mackenzie River, or the still more distant land of
Oregon.
During winter our principal amusement was white-partridge shooting.
This bird is a species of ptarmigan, and is pure white, with the
exception of the tips of the wings and tail. They were very numerous
during the winter, and formed an agreeable dish at our mess-table. I
also enjoyed a little skating at the beginning of the winter; but the
falling snow soon put an end to this amusement.
Spring, beautiful spring! returned again to cheer us in our solitude,
and to open into life the waters and streams of Hudson Bay. Great will
be the difference between the reader's idea of that season in that place
and the reality. Spring, with its fresh green leaves and opening
flowers, its emerald fields and shady groves, filled with sounds of
melody! No, reader; that is not the spring we depict: not quite so
beautiful, though far more prized by those who spend a monotonous winter
of more than six months in solitude. The sun shines brightly in a
cloudless sky, lighting up the pure white fields and plains with
dazzling brilliancy. The gushing waters of a thousand rills, formed by
the melting snow, break sweetly on the ear, like the well-remembered
voice of a long-absent friend. The whistling wings of wild-fowl, as
they ever and anon desert the pools of water now open in the lake and
hurry over the forest-trees, accord well with the shrill cry of the
yellow-leg and curlew, and with the general wildness of the scene; while
the reviving frogs chirrup gladly in the swamps to see the breaking up
of winter and welcome back the spring. This is the spring I write of;
and to have a correct idea of the beauties and the sweetness of _this_
spring, you must first spend a winter in Hudson Bay.
As I said, then, spring returned. The ice melted, floated off, and
vanished. Jack River flowed gently on its way, as if it had never gone
to sleep; and the lake rolled and tumbled on its shores, as if to
congratulate them on the happy change. Soon the boats began to arrive.
First came the "Portage Brigade," in charge of L'Esperance. There were
seven or eight boats; and ere long as many fires burned on the green
beside the fort, with a merry, careless band of wild-looking Canadian
and half-breed _voyageurs_ round each. And a more picturesque set of
fellows I never saw. They were all dressed out in new light-blue
capotes and corduroy trousers, which they tied at the knee with beadwork
garters. Moose-skin moccasins cased their feet, and their brawny,
sunburned necks were bare. A scarlet belt encircled the waist of each;
and while some wore hats with gaudy feathers, others had their heads
adorned with caps and bonnets, surrounded with gold and silver tinsel
hat-cords. A few, however, despising coats, travelled in blue and white
striped shirts, and trusted to their thickly-matted hair to guard them
from the rain and sun. They were truly a wild yet handsome set of men;
and no one, when gazing on their happy faces as they lay or stood in
careless attitudes round the fires, puffing clouds of smoke from their
ever-burning pipes, would have believed that these men had left their
wives and families but the week before, to start on a five months'
voyage of the most harassing description, fraught with the dangers of
the boiling cataracts and foaming rapids of the interior.
They stopped at Norway House on their way, to receive the outfit of
goods for the Indian trade of Athabasca (one of the interior districts);
and were then to start for Portage la Loche, a place where the whole
cargoes are carried on the men's shoulders overland for twelve miles to
the head-waters of another river, where the traders from the northern
posts come to meet them, and, taking the goods, give in exchange the
"returns" in furs of the district.
Next came old Mr Mottle, with his brigade of five boats from Isle a la
Crosse, one of the interior districts; and soon another set of
camp-fires burned on the green, and the clerks' house received another
occupant. After them came the Red River brigades in quick succession:
careful, funny, uproarious Mr Mott, on his way to York for goods
expected by the ship (for you must know Mr Mott keeps a store in Red
River, and is a man of some importance in the colony); and grasping,
comical, close-fisted Mr Macdear; and quiet Mr Sink--all passing
onwards to the sea, rendering Norway House quite lively for a time, and
then leaving it silent. But not for long, as the Saskatchewan brigade,
under the charge of chief trader Harrit and young Mr Polly, suddenly
arrived, and filled the whole country with noise and uproar. The
Saskatchewan brigade is the largest and most noisy that halts at Norway
House. It generally numbers from fifteen to twenty boats, filled with
the wildest men in the service. They come from the prairies and Rocky
Mountains, and are consequently brimful of stories of the buffalo hunt,
attacks upon grizzly bears, and wild Indians--some of them interesting
and true enough, but most of them either tremendous exaggerations, or
altogether inventions of their own wild fancies. Soon after, the light
canoes arrived from Canada, and in them an assortment of raw material
for the service in the shape of four or five green young men.
The clerks' house now became crammed. The quiet, elderly folks, who had
continued to fret at its noisy occupants, fled in despair to another
house, and thereby left room for the newcomers--or greenhorns, as they
were elegantly styled by their more knowing fellow-clerks. Now, indeed,
the corner of the fort in which we lived was avoided by all quiet people
as if it were smitten with the plague; while the loud laugh, uproarious
song, and sounds of the screeching flute or scraping fiddle, issued from
the open doors and windows, frightening away the very mosquitoes, and
making roof and rafters ring. Suddenly a dead silence would ensue; and
then it was conjectured by the knowing ones of the place that Mr Polly
was _coming out strong_ for the benefit of the new arrivals. Mr Polly
had a pleasant way of getting the green ones round him, and, by
detailing some of the wild scenes and incidents of his voyages in the
Saskatchewan, of leading them on from truth to exaggeration, and from
that to fanciful composition, wherein he would detail, with painful
minuteness, all the horrors of Indian warfare, and the improbability of
any one who entered those dreadful regions ever returning alive.
Norway House was now indeed in full blow, and many a happy hour did I
spend upon one of the clerks' beds--every inch of which was generally
occupied--listening to the story or the song. The young men there
assembled had arrived from the distant quarters of America, and some of
them even from England. Some were in the prime of manhood, and had
spent many years in the Indian country; some were beginning to scrape
the down from their still soft chins; while others were boys of
fourteen, who had just left home, and were listening for the first time,
open-mouthed, to their seniors' description of life in the wilderness.
Alas, how soon were those happy, careless young fellows to separate, and
how little probability was there of their ever meeting again! A sort of
friendship had sprung up among three of us. Many a happy hour had we
spent in rambling among the groves and woods of Norway House: now
ranging about in search of wild pigeons, anon splashing and tumbling in
the clear waters of the lake, or rowing over its surface in a light
canoe; while our inexperienced voices filled the woods with snatches of
the wild yet plaintive songs of the _voyageurs_, which we had just begun
to learn. Often had we lain on our little pallet in Bachelors' Hall,
recounting to each other our adventures in the wild woods, or recalling
the days of our childhood, and making promises of keeping up a steady
correspondence through all our separations, difficulties, and dangers.
A year passed away, and at last I got a letter from one of my friends,
dated from the Arctic regions, near the mouth of Mackenzie River; the
other wrote to me from among the snow-clad caps of the Rocky Mountains;
while I addressed them from the swampy, ice-begirt shores of Hudson Bay.
In the Saskatchewan brigade two young bisons were conveyed to York
Factory for the purpose of being shipped for England in the _Prince
Rupert_. They were a couple of the wildest little wretches I ever saw,
and were a source of great annoyance to the men during the voyage. The
way they were taken was odd enough, and I shall here describe it.
In the Saskatchewan the chief food both of white men and Indians is
buffalo meat, so that parties are constantly sent out to hunt the
buffalo. They generally chase them on horseback--the country being
mostly prairie land--and when they get close enough, shoot them with
guns. The Indians, however, shoot them oftener with the bow and arrow,
as they prefer keeping their powder and shot for warfare. They are very
expert with the bow, which is short and strong, and can easily send an
arrow quite through a buffalo at twenty yards off. One of these
parties, then, was ordered to procure two calves alive, if possible, and
lead them to the Company's establishment. This they succeeded in doing
in the following manner. Upon meeting with a herd, they all set off
full gallop in chase. Away went the startled animals at a round trot,
which soon increased to a gallop as the horse men neared them, and a
shot or two told that they were coming within range. Soon the shots
became more numerous, and here and there a black spot on the prairie
told where a buffalo had fallen. No slackening of the pace occurred,
however, as each hunter, upon killing an animal, merely threw down his
cap or mitten to mark it as his own, and continued in pursuit of the
herd, loading his gun as he galloped along. The buffalo-hunters, by the
way, are very expert at loading and firing quickly while going at full
gallop. They carry two or three bullets in their mouths, which they
spit into the muzzles of their guns after dropping in a little powder,
and instead of ramming it down with a rod, merely hit the butt-end of
the gun on the pommel of their saddles; and in this way fire a great
many shots in quick succession. This, however, is a dangerous mode of
shooting, as the ball sometimes sticks half-way down the barrel and
bursts the gun, carrying away a finger, and occasionally a hand.
In this way they soon killed as many buffaloes as they could carry in
their carts, and one of the hunters set off in chase of a calf. In a
short time he edged one away from the rest, and then, getting between it
and the herd, ran straight against it with his horse and knocked it
down. The frightened little animal jumped up again and set off with
redoubled speed; but another butt from the horse again sent it
sprawling. Again it rose, and was again knocked down, and in this way
was at last fairly tired out; when the hunter, jumping suddenly from his
horse, threw a rope round its neck, and drove it before him to the
encampment, and soon after brought it to the fort. It was as wild as
ever when I saw it at Norway House, and seemed to have as much distaste
to its thraldom as the day it was taken.
As the summer advanced the heat increased, and the mosquitoes became
perfectly insupportable. Nothing could save one from the attacks of
these little torments. Almost all other insects went to rest with the
sun: sand-flies, which bite viciously during the day, went to sleep at
night; the large _bull-dog_, whose bite is terrible, slumbered in the
evening; but the mosquito, the long-legged, determined, vicious,
persevering mosquito, whose ceaseless hum dwells for ever on the ear,
_never_ went to sleep. Day and night the painful, tender little pimples
on our necks and behind our ears were being constantly retouched by
these villainous flies, it was useless killing thousands of them--
millions supplied their place. The only thing, in fact, that can
protect one during the night (_nothing_ can during the day) is a net of
gauze hung over the bed; but as this was looked upon by the young men as
somewhat effeminate, it was seldom resorted to. The best thing for
their destruction, we found, was to fill our rooms with smoke, either by
burning damp moss or by letting off large puffs of gunpowder, and then
throwing the doors and windows open to allow them to fly out. This,
however, did not put them all out; so we generally spent an hour or so
before going to bed in hunting them with candles. Even this did not
entirely destroy them; and often might our friends, by looking
telescopically through the keyhole, have seen us wandering during the
late hours of the night in our shirts looking for mosquitoes, like
unhappy ghosts doomed to search perpetually for something they can never
find. The intense, suffocating heat also added greatly to our
discomfort.
In fine weather I used to visit my friend Mr Evans at Rossville, where
I had always a hearty welcome. I remember on one occasion being obliged
to beg the loan of a canoe from an Indian, and having a romantic paddle
across part of Playgreen Lake. I had been offered a passage in a boat
which was going to Rossville, but was not to return. Having nothing
particular to do, however, at the time, I determined to take my chance
of finding a return conveyance of some kind or other. In due time I
arrived at the parsonage, where I spent a pleasant afternoon in
sauntering about the village, and in admiring the rapidity and ease with
which the Indian children could read and write the Indian language by
means of a syllable alphabet invented by their clergyman. The same
gentleman afterwards made a set of leaden types with no other instrument
than a penknife, and printed a great many hymns in the Indian language.
In the evening I began to think of returning to the fort; but no boat or
canoe could be found small enough to be paddled by one man, and as no
one seemed inclined to go with me, I began to fear that I should have to
remain all night. At last a young Indian told me he had a hunting
canoe, which I might have if I chose to venture across the lake in it,
but it was very small. I instantly accepted his offer; and, bidding
adieu to my friends at the parsonage, followed him down to a small creek
overshaded by tall trees, where, concealed among the reeds and bushes,
lay the canoe. It could not, I should think, have measured more than
three yards in length, by eighteen inches in breadth at the middle,
whence it tapered at either end to a thin edge. It was made of birch
bark scarcely a quarter of an inch thick; and its weight may be imagined
when I say that the Indian lifted it from the ground with one hand and
placed it in the water, at the same time handing me a small light
paddle. I stepped in with great care, and the frail bark trembled with
my weight as I seated myself, and pushed out into the lake. The sun had
just set, and his expiring rays cast a glare upon the overhanging clouds
in the west, whilst the shades of night gathered thickly over the
eastern horizon. Not a breath of wind disturbed the glassy smoothness
of the water, in which every golden-tinted cloud was mirrored with a
fidelity that rendered it difficult to say which was image and which
reality. The little bark darted through the water with the greatest
ease, and as I passed among the deepening shadows of the lofty pines,
and across the gilded waters of the bay, a wild enthusiasm seized me; I
strained with all my strength upon the paddle, and the sparkling drops
flew in showers behind me as the little canoe flew over the water more
like a phantom than a reality--when suddenly I missed my stroke; my
whole weight was thrown on one side, the water gurgled over the gunwale
of the canoe, and my heart leaped to my mouth, as I looked for an
instant into the dark water. It was only for a moment; in another
instant the canoe righted, and I paddled the remainder of the way in a
much more gentle manner--enthusiasm gone, and a most wholesome degree of
timidity pervading my entire frame. It was dark when I reached the
fort, and upon landing I took the canoe under my arm and carried it up
the bank with nearly as much ease as if it had been a camp-stool.
When the day was warm and the sun bright--when the sky was clear and the
water blue--when the air was motionless, and the noise of arrivals and
departures had ceased--when work was at a stand, and we enjoyed the
felicity of having nothing to do, Mr Russ and I used to saunter down to
the water's edge to have an hour or two's fishing. The fish we fished
for were goldeyes, and the manner of our fishing was this:--
Pausing occasionally as we walked along, one of us might be observed to
bend in a watchful manner over the grass, and, gradually assuming the
position of a quadruped, fall plump upon his hands and knees. Having
achieved this feat, he would rise with a grasshopper between his finger
and thumb; a tin box being then held open by the other, the unlucky
insect was carefully introduced to the interior, and the lid closed
sharply--some such remark attending each capture as that "_That_ one was
safe," or, "There went another;" and the mystery of the whole proceeding
being explained by the fact that these same incarcerated grasshoppers
were intended to form the bait with which we trusted to beguile the
unwary goldeyes to their fate.
Having arrived at the edge of the place where we usually fished, each
drew from a cleft in the rock a stout branch of a tree, around the end
of which was wound a bit of twine with a large hook attached to it.
This we unwound quickly, and after impaling a live grasshopper upon the
barbs of our respective hooks, dropped them into the water, and gazed
intently at the lines. Mr Russ, who was a great lover of angling, now
began to get excited, and made several violent pulls at the line, under
the impression that something had _bitten_. Suddenly his rod, stout as
it was, bent with the immense muscular force applied to it, and a small
goldeye, about three or four inches long, flashed like an electric spark
from the water, and fell with bursting force on the rocks behind, at the
very feet of a small Indian boy, who sat, nearly in a state of nature,
watching our movements from among the bushes. The little captive was of
a bright silvery colour, with a golden eye, and is an excellent fish for
breakfast. The truth of the proverb, "It never rains but it pours," was
soon verified by the immense number of goldeyes of every size, from one
foot to four inches, which we showered into the bushes behind us. Two
or three dozen were caught in a few minutes, and at last we began to get
quite exhausted; and Mr Russ proposed going up to the house for his new
fly-rod, by way of diversifying the sport, and rendering it more
scientific.
Down he came again in a few minutes, with a splendidly varnished,
extremely slim rod, with an invisible line and an aerial fly. This
instrument was soon put up; and Mr Russ, letting out six fathoms of
line, stood erect, and making a splendid heave, caught the Indian boy by
the hair! This was an embarrassing commencement; but being an easy,
good-natured man, he only frowned the boy out of countenance, and
shortened his line. The next cast was more successful; the line swept
gracefully through the air, and fell in a series of elegant circles
within a few feet of the rock on which he stood. Goldeyes, however, are
not particular; and ere he could draw the line straight, a very large
one darted at the fly, and swallowed it. The rod bent into a beautiful
oval as Mr Russ made a futile attempt to whip the fish over his head,
according to custom, and the line straightened with fearful rigidity as
the fish began to pull for its life. The fisher became energetic, and
the fish impatient, but there was no prospect of its ever being landed;
till at last, having got his rod inextricably entangled among the
neighbouring bushes, he let it fall, and most unscientifically hauled
the fish out by the line, exclaiming, in the bitterness of his heart,
"that rods were contemptible childish things, and that a stout branch of
a tree was the rod for him." This last essay seemed to have frightened
all the rest away, for not another bite did we get after that.
Towards the beginning of June 1843, orders arrived from headquarters,
appointing me to spend the approaching winter at York Factory, the place
where I had first pressed American soil. It is impossible to describe
the joy with which I received the news. Whether it was my extreme
fondness for travelling, or the mere love of change, I cannot tell, but
it had certainly the effect of affording me immense delight, and I set
about making preparation for the journey immediately. The arrival of
the canoes from Canada was to be the signal for my departure, and I
looked forward to their appearance with great impatience.
In a few days the canoes arrived; and on the 4th of June, 1843, I
started, in company with several other gentlemen, in two north canoes.
These light, graceful craft were about thirty-six feet long, by from
five to six broad, and were capable of containing eight men and three
passengers. They were made entirely of birch bark, and gaudily painted
on the bow and stern. In these fairy-like boats, then, we swept swiftly
over Playgreen Lake, the bright vermilion paddles glancing in the
sunshine, and the woods echoing to the lively tune of _A la claire
fontaine_, sung by the two crews in full chorus. We soon left Norway
House far behind us, and ere long were rapidly descending the streams
that flow through the forests of the interior into Hudson Bay.
While running one of the numerous rapids with which these rivers abound,
our canoe struck upon a rock, which tore a large hole in its side.
Fortunately the accident happened close to the shore, and nearly at the
usual breakfasting hour; so that while some of the men repaired the
damages, which they did in half an hour, we employed ourselves agreeably
in demolishing a huge ham, several slices of bread, and a cup or two of
strong tea.
This was the only event worth relating that happened to us during the
voyage; and as canoe-travelling is enlarged upon in another chapter, we
will jump at once to the termination of our journey.