"I have already hinted at those masterpieces of voracity for which the region is renowned; yet the undoubted facts related around our campfires, and otherwise, a few of which follow, almost beggar belief. Mr. Young, of our party, an old Hudson's Bay officer, knew of sixteen trackers who, in a few days, consumed eight bears, two moose, two bags of pemmican, two sacks of flour, and three sacks of potatoes. Bishop Grouard vouched for four men eating a reindeer at a sitting. Our friend, Mr. d'Eschambault, once gave Oskinnegu,—'The Young Man'—six pounds of pemmican. He ate it all at a meal, washing it down with a gallon of tea, and then complained that he had not had enough. Sir George Simpson states that at Athabasca Lake, in 1820, he was one of a party of twelve who ate twenty-two geese and three ducks at a single meal. But, as he says, they had been three whole days without food. The Saskatchewan folk, however, known of old as the Gens de Blaireaux—'The People of the Badger Holes'—were not behind their congeners. That man of weight and might, our old friend Chief Factor Belanger, once served out to thirteen men a sack of pemmican weighing ninety pounds. It was enough for three days; but there and then they sat down and consumed it all at a single meal, not, it must be added, without some subsequent and just pangs of indigestion. Mr. B., having occasion to pass the place of eating, and finding the sack of pemmican, as he supposed, in his path, gave it a kick; but, to his amazement, it bounded aloft several feet, and then lit. It was empty! When it is remembered that in the old buffalo days the daily ration per head at the Company's prairie posts was eight pounds of fresh meat, which was all eaten, its equivalent being two pounds of pemmican, the enormity of this Gargantuan feast may be imagined. But we ourselves were not bad hands at the trencher. In fact, we were always hungry. So I do not reproduce the foregoing facts as a reproach, but rather as a meagre tribute to the prowess of the great of old—the men of unbounded stomach!"
And yet, strange as it may seem, fat men are seldom seen in the northern wilderness. That is something movie directors should remember.
Pemmican, though little used nowadays, was formerly the mainstay of the voyageurs. It was made of the flesh of buffalo, musk-ox, moose, caribou, wapiti, beaver, rabbit, or ptarmigan; and for ordinary use was composed of 66 per cent. of dried meat pounded fine to 34 per cent. of hard fat boiled and strained. A finer quality of pemmican for officers or travellers was composed of 60 per cent. of dried meat pounded extra fine and sifted; 33 per cent. of grease taken from marrow bones boiled and strained; 5 per cent. of dried Saskatoon berries; 2 per cent. of dried choke cherries, and sugar according to taste. The pounded meat was placed in a large wooden trough and, being spread out, hot grease was poured over it and then stirred until thoroughly mixed with the meat. Then, after first letting it cool somewhat, the whole was packed into leather bags, and, with the aid of wooden mallets, driven down into a solid mass, when the bags were sewn up and flattened out and left to cool; during the cooling precaution was taken to turn the bags every five minutes to prevent the grease settling too much to one side. Pemmican was packed 50, 80, or 100 lb. in a bag—according to the difficulty of transporting it through the country in which it was to be used. The best pemmican was made from buffalo meat, and 2 lb. of buffalo pemmican was considered equal to 2 1/2 lb. of moose or 3 lb. of caribou pemmican.
Later, a cool sunset breeze from over the water blew the little tormentors away, and then it was that those swarthy men enjoyed their rest. After supper some made bannock batter in the mouths of flour-sacks, adding water, salt, and baking powder. This they worked into balls and spread out in sizzling pans arranged obliquely before the fire with a bed of coals at the back of each. It was an enlivening scene. Great roaring fires sent glowing sparks high into the still night air, lighting up the trees with their intense glare, and casting weird shadows upon the surrounding tents and bushes. Picturesque, wild-looking men laughed, talked, and gesticulated at one another. A few with capotes off were sitting close to the fires, and flipping into the air the browning flap-jacks that were to be eaten the following day. Others, with hoods over their heads, lolled back from the fire smoking their pipes—and by the way, novelists and movie directors and actors should know that the natives of the northern wilderness, both white and red, do not smoke cigarettes; they smoke pipes and nothing else. Some held their moccasins before the fire to dry, or arranged their blankets for turning in. Others slipped away under cover of darkness to rub pork rinds on the bottom of their canoes, for there was much rivalry as to the speed of the crews. Still more beautiful grows the scene, when the June moon rises above the trees and tips with flickering light the running waves.
Sauntering from one crew's fire to another, I listened for a while to the talking and laughing of the voyageurs, but hearing no thrilling tales or even a humorous story by that noted romancer Old Billy Brass, I went over and sat down at the officers' fire, where Chief Factor Thompson was discussing old days and ways with his brother trader.
THE LONGEST BRIGADE ROUTES
After a little while I asked:
"What was the longest route of the old-time canoe and boat brigades?"
"There were several very long ones," replied Mr. Thompson, "for instance, the one from Montreal to Vancouver, a distance of about three thousand miles; also the one from York Factory on Hudson Bay to the Queen Charlotte Islands, and another from York Factory to the Mackenzie River posts. Some of the portages on the main highway of canoe travel were rather long, for instance, the one at Portage La Loche was twelve miles in length and over it everything had to be carried on man back.
"In winter time, travel was by way of snowshoes, dog-sled, or jumper. A jumper is a low, short, strong sleigh set upon heavy wooden runners and hauled by ox, horse, men, or dogs. The freight load per dog—as you know—is a hundred pounds; per man, one to two hundred pounds; per horse, four to six hundred pounds; and per ox, five to seven hundred pounds. In summer there were the canoe, York boat, sturgeon-head scow, and Red River cart brigades. A six-fathom canoe carries from twenty to thirty packages; a York boat, seventy-five packages; a Sturgeon-head scow, one hundred packages; and a Red River cart, six hundred pounds. The carts were made entirely of wood and leather and were hauled by horse or ox. With every brigade went the wife of one of the voyageurs to attend to the mending of the voyageurs' clothing and to look after the comfort of the officer in charge. But the voyageurs always had to do their own cooking and washing.