[Illustration]
The Young Fur-Traders
by R. M. Ballantyne
Contents
PREFACE
CHAPTER I
Plunges the reader into the middle of an arctic winter; conveys him
into the heart of the wildernesses of North America; and introduces him
to some of the principal personages of our tale
CHAPTER II
The old fur-trader endeavours to “fix” his son’s “flint,” and finds the
thing more difficult to do than he expected
CHAPTER III
The counting-room
CHAPTER IV.
A wolf-hunt in the prairies; Charley astonishes his father, and breaks
in the “noo’oss” effectually
CHAPTER V
Peter Mactavish becomes an amateur doctor; Charley promulgates his
views of things in general to Kate; and Kate waxes sagacious
CHAPTER VI
Spring and the voyageurs
CHAPTER VII
The store
CHAPTER VIII
Farewell to Kate; departure of the brigade; Charley becomes a voyageur
CHAPTER IX
The voyage; the encampment; a surprise
CHAPTER X
Varieties, vexations, and vicissitudes
CHAPTER XI
Charley and Harry begin their sporting career without much success;
Whisky-John catching
CHAPTER XII
The storm
CHAPTER XIII
The canoe; ascending the rapids; the portage; deer-shooting and life in
the woods
CHAPTER XIV
The Indian camp; the new outpost; Charley sent on a mission to the
Indians
CHAPTER XV
The feast; Charley makes his first speech in public; meets with an old
friend; an evening in the grass
CHAPTER XVI
The return; narrow escape; a murderous attempt, which fails; and a
discovery
CHAPTER XVII
The scene changes; Bachelors’ Hall; a practical joke and its
consequences; a snow-shoe walk at night in the forest
CHAPTER XVIII
The walk continued; frozen toes; an encampment in the snow
CHAPTER XIX
Shows how the accountant and Harry set their traps, and what came of it
CHAPTER XX
The accountant’s story
CHAPTER XXI
Ptarmigan-hunting; Hamilton’s shooting powers severely tested; a
snow-storm
CHAPTER XXII
The winter packet; Harry hears from old friends, and wishes that he was
with them
CHAPTER XXIII
Changes; Harry and Hamilton find that variety is indeed, charming; the
latter astonishes the former considerably
CHAPTER XXIV
Hopes and fears; an unexpected meeting; philosophical talk between the
hunter and the parson
CHAPTER XXV
Good news and romantic scenery; bear-hunting and its results
CHAPTER XXVI
An unexpected meeting, and an unexpected deer-hunt; arrival at the
outpost; disagreement with the natives; an enemy discovered, and a
murder
CHAPTER XXVII
The chase; the fight; retribution; low spirits and good news
CHAPTER XXVIII
Old friends and scenes; coming events cast their shadows before
CHAPTER XXIX
The first day at home; a gallop in the prairie, and its consequences
CHAPTER XXX
Love; old Mr. Kennedy puts his foot in it
CHAPTER XXXI
The course of true love, curiously enough, runs smooth for once; and
the curtain falls
PREFACE.
In writing this book my desire has been to draw an exact copy of the
picture which is indelibly stamped on my own memory. I have carefully
avoided exaggeration in everything of importance. All the chief, and
most of the minor incidents are facts. In regard to unimportant
matters, I have taken the liberty of a novelist—not to colour too
highly, or to invent improbabilities, but—to transpose time, place, and
circumstance at pleasure; while, at the same time, I have endeavoured
to convey to the reader’s mind a truthful impression of the _general
effect_—to use a painter’s language—of the life and country of the Fur
Trader.
EDINBURGH, 1856.
CHAPTER I.
Plunges the reader into the middle of an Arctic winter; conveys him
into the heart of the wildernesses of North America; and introduces him
to some of the principal personages of our tale.
Snowflakes and sunbeams, heat and cold, winter and summer, alternated
with their wonted regularity for fifteen years in the wild regions of
the Far North. During this space of time the hero of our tale sprouted
from babyhood to boyhood, passed through the usual amount of accidents,
ailments, and vicissitudes incidental to those periods of life, and
finally entered upon that ambiguous condition that precedes early
manhood.
It was a clear, cold winter’s day. The sunbeams of summer were long
past, and snowflakes had fallen thickly on the banks of Red River.
Charley sat on a lump of blue ice, his head drooping and his eyes bent
on the snow at his feet with an expression of deep disconsolation.
Kate reclined at Charley’s side, looking wistfully up in his expressive
face, as if to read the thoughts that were chasing each other through
his mind, like the ever-varying clouds that floated in the winter sky
above. It was quite evident to the most careless observer that,
whatever might be the usual temperaments of the boy and girl, their
present state of mind was not joyous, but on the contrary, very sad.
“It won’t do, sister Kate,” said Charley. “I’ve tried him over and over
again—I’ve implored, begged, and entreated him to let me go; but he
won’t, and I’m determined to run away, so there’s an end of it!”
As Charley gave utterance to this unalterable resolution, he rose from
the bit of blue ice, and taking Kate by the hand, led her over the
frozen river, climbed up the bank on the opposite side—an operation of
some difficulty, owing to the snow, which had been drifted so deeply
during a late storm that the usual track was almost obliterated—and
turning into a path that lost itself among the willows, they speedily
disappeared.
As it is possible our reader may desire to know who Charley and Kate
are, and the part of the world in which they dwell, we will interrupt
the thread of our narrative to explain.
In the very centre of the great continent of North America, far removed
from the abodes of civilised men, and about twenty miles to the south
of Lake Winnipeg, exists a colony composed of Indians, Scotsmen, and
French-Canadians, which is known by the name of Red River Settlement.
Red River differs from most colonies in more respects than one—the
chief differences being, that whereas other colonies cluster on the
sea-coast, this one lies many hundreds of miles in the interior of the
country, and is surrounded by a wilderness; and while other colonies,
acting on the Golden Rule, export their produce in return for goods
imported, this of Red River imports a large quantity, and exports
nothing, or next to nothing. Not but that it _might_ export, if it only
had an outlet or a market; but being eight hundred miles removed from
the sea, and five hundred miles from the nearest market, with a series
of rivers, lakes, rapids, and cataracts separating from the one, and a
wide sweep of treeless prairie dividing from the other, the settlers
have long since come to the conclusion that they were born to consume
their own produce, and so regulate the extent of their farming
operations by the strength of their appetites. Of course, there are
many of the necessaries, or at least the luxuries, of life which the
colonists cannot grow—such as tea, coffee, sugar, coats, trousers, and
shirts—and which, consequently, they procure from England, by means of
the Hudson’s Bay Fur Company’s ships, which sail once a year from
Gravesend, laden with supplies for the trade carried on with the
Indians. And the bales containing these articles are conveyed in boats
up the rivers, carried past the waterfalls and rapids overland on the
shoulders of stalwart voyageurs, and finally landed at Red River, after
a rough trip of many weeks’ duration. The colony was founded in 1811,
by the Earl of Selkirk, previously to which it had been a trading-post
of the Fur Company. At the time of which we write, it contained about
five thousand souls, and extended upwards of fifty miles along the Red
and Assiniboine rivers, which streams supplied the settlers with a
variety of excellent fish. The banks were clothed with fine trees; and
immediately behind the settlement lay the great prairies, which
extended in undulating waves—almost entirely devoid of shrub or tree—to
the base of the Rocky Mountains.
Although far removed from the civilised world, and containing within
its precincts much that is savage and very little that is refined, Red
River is quite a populous paradise, as compared with the desolate,
solitary establishments of the Hudson’s Bay Fur Company. These lonely
dwellings of the trader are scattered far and wide over the whole
continent—north, south, east, and west. Their population generally
amounts to eight or ten men—seldom to thirty. They are planted in the
thick of an uninhabited desert—their next neighbours being from two to
five hundred miles off—their occasional visitors, bands of wandering
Indians—and the sole object of their existence being to trade the furry
hides of foxes, martens, beavers, badgers, bears, buffaloes, and
wolves. It will not, then, be deemed a matter of wonder that the
gentlemen who have charge of these establishments, and who, perchance,
may have spent ten or twenty years in them, should look upon the colony
of Red River as a species of Elysium, a sort of haven of rest, in which
they may lay their weary heads, and spend the remainder of their days
in peaceful felicity, free from the cares of a residence among wild
beasts and wild men. Many of the retiring traders prefer casting their
lot in Canada; but not a few of them _smoke_ out the remainder of their
existence in this colony—especially those who, having left home as boys
fifty or sixty years before, cannot reasonably expect to find the
friends of their childhood where they left them, and cannot hope to
remodel tastes and habits long nurtured in the backwoods so as to
relish the manners and customs of civilised society.
Such an one was old Frank Kennedy, who, sixty years before the date of
our story, ran away from school in Scotland; got a severe thrashing
from his father for so doing; and having no mother in whose
sympathising bosom he could weep out his sorrow, ran away from home,
went to sea, ran away from his ship while she lay at anchor in the
harbour of New York, and after leading a wandering, unsettled life for
several years, during which he had been alternately a clerk, a
day-labourer, a store-keeper and a village schoolmaster, he wound up by
entering the service of the Hudson’s Bay Company, in which he obtained
an insight into savage life, a comfortable fortune, besides a
half-breed wife and a large family.
Being a man of great energy and courage, and moreover possessed of a
large, powerful frame, he was sent to one of the most distant posts on
the Mackenzie River, as being admirably suited for the display of his
powers both mental and physical. Here the small-pox broke out among the
natives, and besides carrying off hundreds of these poor creatures,
robbed Mr. Kennedy of all his children save two, Charles and Kate, whom
we have already introduced to the reader.
About the same time the council which is annually held at Red River in
spring for the purpose of arranging the affairs of the country for the
ensuing year thought proper to appoint Mr. Kennedy to a still more
outlandish part of the country—as near, in fact, to the North Pole as
it was possible for mortal man to live—and sent him an order to proceed
to his destination without loss of time. On receiving this
communication, Mr. Kennedy upset his chair, stamped his foot, ground
his teeth, and vowed, in the hearing of his wife and children, that
sooner than obey the mandate he would see the governors and council of
Rupert’s Land hanged, quartered, and boiled down into tallow!
Ebullitions of this kind were peculiar to Frank Kennedy, and meant
_nothing_. They were simply the safety-valves to his superabundant ire,
and, like safety-valves in general, made much noise but did no damage.
It was well, however, on such occasions to keep out of the old
fur-trader’s way; for he had an irresistible propensity to hit out at
whatever stood before him, especially if the object stood on a level
with his own eyes and wore whiskers. On second thoughts, however, he
sat down before his writing-table, took a sheet of blue ruled foolscap
paper, seized a quill which he had mended six months previously, at a
time when he happened to be in high good-humour, and wrote as follows:—
To the Governor and Council of Rupert’s Land,
Red River Settlement.
Fort Paskisegun
_June_ 15, 18—.
GENTLEMEN,—I have the honour to acknowledge receipt of your favour of
26th April last, appointing me to the charge of Peel’s River, and
directing me to strike out new channels of trade in that quarter. In
reply, I have to state that I shall have the honour to fulfil your
instructions by taking my departure in a light canoe as soon as
possible. At the same time I beg humbly to submit that the state of my
health is such as to render it expedient for me to retire from the
service, and I herewith beg to hand in my resignation. I shall hope to
be relieved early next spring.—I have the honour to be, gentlemen, your
most obedient, humble servant,
F. KENNEDY.
“There!” exclaimed the old gentleman, in a tone that would lead one to
suppose he had signed the death-warrant, and so had irrevocably fixed
the certain destruction, of the entire council—“there!” said he, rising
from his chair, and sticking the quill into the ink-bottle with a _dab_
that split it up to the feather, and so rendered it _hors de combat_
for all time coming.
To this letter the council gave a short reply, accepting his
resignation, and appointing a successor. On the following spring old
Mr. Kennedy embarked his wife and children in a bark canoe, and in
process of time landed them safely in Red River Settlement. Here he
purchased a house with six acres of land, in which he planted a variety
of useful vegetables, and built a summer-house after the fashion of a
conservatory, where he was wont to solace himself for hours together
with a pipe, or rather with dozens of pipes, of Canadian twist tobacco.
After this he put his two children to school. The settlement was at
this time fortunate in having a most excellent academy, which was
conducted by a very estimable man. Charles and Kate Kennedy, being
obedient and clever, made rapid progress under his judicious
management, and the only fault that he had to find with the young
people was, that Kate was a little too quiet and fond of books, while
Charley was a little too riotous and fond of fun.
When Charles arrived at the age of fifteen and Kate attained to
fourteen years, old Mr. Kennedy went into his conservatory, locked the
door, sat down on an easy chair, filled a long clay pipe with his
beloved tobacco, smoked vigorously for ten minutes, and fell fast
asleep. In this condition he remained until the pipe fell from his lips
and broke in fragments on the floor. He then rose, filled another pipe,
and sat down to meditate on the subject that had brought him to his
smoking apartment. “There’s my wife,” said he, looking at the bowl of
his pipe, as if he were addressing himself to it, “she’s getting too
old to be looking after everything herself (_puff_), and Kate’s getting
too old to be humbugging any longer with books: besides, she ought to
be at home learning to keep house, and help her mother, and cut the
baccy (_puff_), and that young scamp Charley should be entering the
service (_puff_). He’s clever enough now to trade beaver and bears from
the red-skins; besides, he’s (_puff_) a young rascal, and I’ll be bound
does nothing but lead the other boys into (_puff_) mischief, although,
to be sure, the master _does_ say he’s the cleverest fellow in the
school; but he must be reined up a bit now. I’ll clap on a double curb
and martingale. I’ll get him a situation in the counting-room at the
fort (_puff_), where he’ll have his nose held tight to the grindstone.
Yes, I’ll fix both their flints to-morrow;” and old Mr. Kennedy gave
vent to another puff so thick and long that it seemed as if all the
previous puffs had concealed themselves up to this moment within his
capacious chest, and rushed out at last in one thick and long-continued
stream.
By “fixing their flints” Mr. Kennedy meant to express the fact that he
intended to place his children in an entirely new sphere of action, and
with a view to this he ordered out his horse and cariole[1] on the
following morning, went up to the school, which was about ten miles
distant from his abode, and brought his children home with him the same
evening. Kate was now formally installed as housekeeper and
tobacco-cutter; while Charley was told that his future destiny was to
wield the quill in the service of the Hudson’s Bay Company, and that he
might take a week to think over it. Quiet, warm-hearted, affectionate
Kate was overjoyed at the thought of being a help and comfort to her
old father and mother; but reckless, joyous, good-humoured,
hare-brained Charley was cast into the depths of despair at the idea of
spending the livelong day, and day after day, for years it might be, on
the top of a long-legged stool. In fact, poor Charley said that he
“would rather become a buffalo than do it.” Now this was very wrong of
Charley, for, of course, he didn’t _mean_ it. Indeed, it is too much a
habit among little boys, ay, and among grown-up people, too, to say
what they don’t mean, as no doubt you are aware, dear reader, if you
possess half the self-knowledge we give you credit for; and we cannot
too strongly remonstrate with ourself and others against the
practice—leading, as it does, to all sorts of absurd exaggerations,
such as gravely asserting that we are “broiling hot” when we are simply
“rather warm,” or more than “half dead” with fatigue when we are merely
“very tired.” However, Charley _said_ that he would rather be “a
buffalo than do it,” and so we feel bound in honour to record the fact.
[1] A sort of sleigh.
Charley and Kate were warmly attached to each other. Moreover, they had
been, ever since they could walk, in the habit of mingling their little
joys and sorrows in each other’s bosoms; and although, as years flew
past, they gradually ceased to sob in each other’s arms at every little
mishap, they did not cease to interchange their inmost thoughts, and to
mingle their tears when occasion called them forth. They knew the
power, the inexpressible sweetness, of sympathy. They understood
experimentally the comfort and joy that flow from obedience to that
blessed commandment to “rejoice with those that do rejoice, and weep
with those that weep.” It was natural, therefore, that on Mr. Kennedy
announcing his decrees, Charley and Kate should hasten to some retired
spot where they could commune in solitude; the effect of which
communing was to reduce them to a somewhat calmer and rather happy
state of mind. Charley’s sorrow was blunted by sympathy with Kate’s
joy, and Kate’s joy was subdued by sympathy with Charley’s sorrow; so
that, after the first effervescing burst, they settled down into a calm
and comfortable state of flatness, with very red eyes and exceedingly
pensive minds. We must, however, do Charley the justice to say that the
red eyes applied only to Kate; for although a tear or two could without
much coaxing be induced to hop over his sun-burned cheek, he had got
beyond that period of life when boys are addicted to (we must give the
word, though not pretty, because it is eminently expressive)
_blubbering_.
A week later found Charley and his sister seated on the lump of blue
ice where they were first introduced to the reader, and where Charley
announced his unalterable resolve to run away, following it up with the
statement that _that_ was “the end of it.” He was quite mistaken,
however, for that was by no means the end of it. In fact it was only
the beginning of it, as we shall see hereafter.