Three Boys in the Wild North Land

by Egerton Ryerson Young

There were no less than six varieties of foxes, the most valuable being the black and silver ones. Then there were cross foxes, blue foxes, as well as white and red ones. The rich otters and splendid black beavers very much interested them, and especially the prime bear and wolf skins. And as they looked at them and many other kinds their mouths fairly watered at the prospect of during the few months being engaged in the exciting sport of capturing the comrades of these in their native forests.

Yes, they would succeed in some instances, as our book will tell; but now as they looked at these splendid skins lying so quiet and still they little imagined the dangers and hardships which would be theirs ere the fierce bears and savage wolves they were to assail would render up their splendid robes.

Very much interested also were they in the hardy voyageurs, or trip men, who constituted these brigades. Dark and swarthy they were, with beardless faces, and long black hair that rested on their shoulders. From remote and different regions had they come. Here were brigades from the Assiniboine, Red River, Cumberland, and the Saskatchewan region. Many of the boatmen were of the Metis—half-French and Indian; and they spoke a language that was a mixture of both, with some English intermixed that was not always the most polite.

From the mighty Saskatchewan had come down that great river for a thousand miles, and then onward for several hundred more, brigades that had, in addition to the furs and robes of that land, large supplies of dried meat and tallow, and many bags of the famous food called pemmican, obtained from the great herds of buffalo that still, in those days, like the cattle on a thousand hills, thundered through the land and grazed on its rich pasturage and drank from its beautiful streams. The men of these Saskatchewan brigades were warriors who had often been in conflict with hostile tribes, and could tell exciting stories of scalping parties, and the fierce conflict for their lives when beleaguered by some relentless foes. Some of them bore on face or scalp the marks of the wounds received in close tomahawk encounter, and, for the gift of a pocketknife or gaudy handkerchief from our eager boys, rehearsed with all due enlargement the story of the fierce encounter with superior numbers of their bitterest enemies, how they had so gloriously triumphed, but had not come off unscathed, as these great scars did testify.

Thus excited and interested did the boys wander from one encampment of these brigades to another. The word had early gone out from the chief factor, Mr McTavish, that these boys were his special friends, and as such were to be treated with consideration by all. This was quite sufficient to insure them a welcome everywhere, and so they acquired a good deal of general information as they became acquainted with people from places of which they had heard but little, and from others of some regions until then to them unknown.

In addition to those already referred to, there were brigades from Lac-la-Puie, the Lake of the Woods, Cumberland House, Athabasca, and Swan River, and other places many hundreds of miles away.

As each brigade arrived it formed its own encampment separate from the others. Here the fires of dry logs were built on the ground, and the meals prepared and eaten. When the day’s work was over, the men gathered around the fire’s bright glow and smoked their pipes, laughed and chatted, and then, each wrapping himself in a single blanket, they lay down on the ground to sleep, with no roof above them but the stars.

As the goods brought from England in large bulk had to be made up into bundles, called in the language of the country “pieces,” each weighing from eighty to one hundred pounds, that could be easily carried around the portages by the Indians, several days must elapse ere the return trip would be begun. Very interesting were these days to the boys, as from camp fire to camp fire they wandered, making friends everywhere with the Indians by their hearty, manly ways.

At first the wildest and fiercest looking fellows most attracted them; those wild warriors who could tell of scalping parties and horse-stealing adventures among the warlike tribes of the great plains. After a while, however, they found themselves most interested in the brigades that could travel fastest, that had the record of making the fastest trip in the shortest time. What at first was a surprise to them was that the brigades that held these best records were the Christian ones, who took time to say their prayers morning and evening and always rested on the Sabbath. This proved that these hard-working men, who rested one day in seven, could do and did better and faster work than those who knew no Sabbath, but pushed on from day to day without rest. Man as a working animal needs the day of rest, and with one off in seven will, as has been here and in other places proved, do better work in the remaining six than the one who takes no day of rest.

Soon after the arrival of the brigades with the furs, which were estimated as being worth in London over three hundred thousand pounds, they were all safely stowed away in the vessel, and a favourable wind springing up from the south-west, the anchor was lifted, the sails hoisted, and the good ship Prince Arthur started on her return voyage to the old land. The boys waved their handkerchiefs and shouted their farewells until the vessel was far out on the dancing waves like a thing of life and beauty.