Selected for Dangerous Mission
Just another incident, which, while it does not amount to much, was all-important to me at that critical moment.
WINNIPEG OF TO-DAY
Main Street (above); Portage Avenue (below).
It happened on the Saskatchewan whose lazily-rolling waters flow from the far-away Rockies, through the pine lands and plains of the Canadian Northwest and empty into murky Lake Winnipeg, from which they are carried to Hudson Bay, and for all I know mingle with those of the Arctic and Atlantic oceans. And it came about through that almost incomprehensible perversity or foolhardiness or obliging disposition which impels one to help a fellow out of a hole and causes a certain class of happy-go lucky people to rush in where white-winged spirits would not attempt to fly, let alone tread. To be exact, it was the day before the beginning of the long-stretched out skirmishing at Batoche, which resulted in the charge which led to the discomfiture of Riel and the dispersal of his dusky forces. The sun shone bright and strong on that lazy May afternoon, with not a breath of air stirring; and Gabriel’s Crossing, where the stern-wheeler Northcote was tied to the bank, was drowsy and sleepy as if the recalcitrant halfbreeds and Indians were a thousand miles away and not lurking in the nearby woods. The arrival of the mail—a not very regular occurrence—was a decided break in the irksome monotony—the pleasantness of which, however, was modified by instant disappointment. The Canadian troops had marched away that morning to take up a position behind the rebel headquarters at Batoche, and the mail carrier would not deliver up the bag for reasons sufficient for him, but insisted on taking it on to the camp sixteen miles away. There was nothing to do but follow after him for our letters and our papers, and George Macleod, one of the couriers attached to the small detachment on the steamer, was detailed for the duty. There was to be a fight on the morrow with a strongly-entrenched savage foe of whose strength we knew very little, but whose wily tactics and deadly aim had been deeply impressed upon us a short time before at Fish Creek, and we were eager to hear what perhaps might be the last word from home. For the Northcote was to take part in the coming engagement—steaming down the river past the rebel stronghold and drawing the enemy’s fire while the troops were to rush in from the rear, and—but this story has nothing whatever to do with that.
Macleod quickly reported himself ready. Then Captain So-and-So asked him to bring something or other from camp, and Lieutenant What’s-his-name wanted him to carry a message to a comrade, and non-coms. and men had requests galore for parcels and other truck until poor Macleod had more commissions than a corporal’s guard could execute in a fortnight. He remarked—sarcastic like—that perhaps it would be easier to march the whole column from Batoche back to the boat than “to git all them things,” so it was decided that someone or other should accompany him. Why that someone should have been myself does not after all these years appear very clearly to me, nor did it then; but Colonel Bedson—God rest his soul—suggested that I should go and even if we didn’t return the naval brigade would not be so seriously handicapped as to render it entirely ineffective. That settled it; so Macleod and I—a humble newspaper correspondent—and Peter Hourie’s pony which was attached to Peter Hourie’s buckboard, kindly loaned for the occasion—Peter was an interpreter—started out on our mission. A well-beaten trail led due south through dense woods, and we followed it for five or six miles and then the freshly broken turf showed that the column had turned sharp to the left, and paralleled the river towards Batoche, marching through a park-like country with bluffs and openings and dotted with little ponds. There was a remarkable similarity in the surroundings for many a mile, so much so that one portion was confusingly like another—but it was a winsome scene whose restfulness and calm were accentuated by the jarring discordant events of previous days. In these northern latitudes, Nature is unusually lavish with her gifts and here she had created a picturesque demesne that was remindful of well-kept ancestral estates in the Old Country. It was Nature in her simple beauty—unadorned except with that adornment which the hand of the Master alone can give. It was the summer dreamland—a scenic poem—a fragment of incomparable Kentish landscape in a glorious Canadian setting.