“But now,” he added, “we are getting beyond the country even of the Crees. Here at Chippewyan is the farthest north of the Cree so far. Now we are going to find a lot of other different tribes.”
The boys passed here and there along the rocky shore among the villages of the natives and among the stoutly built log houses of the fur-post itself. Here and there a woman was sitting in front of her tent, trying to operate one of the little cheap hand sewing-machines which had been brought on for the first time that year. In another tent strange sounds came which seemed familiar to the boys. They discovered that a proud family had purchased a cheap phonograph, and under the instruction of one of the clerks was proceeding to produce what is sometimes called melody. These things, however, did not interest the young adventurers so much as the more primitive scenes of the native life.
Here they saw a boatman fresh from his nets, with half a boat-load of fish still alive, throw out some of the live fish, among them a number of pickerel, or Great Northern Pike, to his dogs, which sat waiting on the shore for his arrival. A dog would seize a five-pound fish by the head, kill it, and eat it outright, bones and all.
“They never get enough to eat,” said John. “They’re hungry all the time.”
“Well,” said Jesse, laughing, “that’s the same way with you, isn’t it, John?”
“That’s all right,” said John, testily. “I’m growing, that’s why I eat so much. But as for you, Jesse, you’d better keep away from these dogs. Do you know what I heard? It was old Colin Frazer, the fur-trader, told me. He said there was a child killed last winter out on the ice by dogs, and they ate it up, every bit. You see, it had on a caribou coat, and it was alone at the time. The dogs killed it and ate it. Sometimes they eat little dogs, too. They’ll eat anything and never get enough. But I suppose they have to have dogs here the same as they have to have Indians, else they could have no fur trade.”
“The old trader up at the post is mighty crusty, it seems to me,” complained Jesse, after a time. “He won’t let me go up in the fur-loft, where he keeps his silver-gray foxes and all that sort of thing, to make any pictures. What’s the reason he won’t?”
Rob smiled as he answered: “The Hudson’s Bay Company is a big monopoly and it keeps its own secrets. You’ll have to ask a good many questions before you find out much about its business. And if you should try to buy even one skin of an ermine or a marten or a fox or a mink in here, you couldn’t do it. They wouldn’t sell you anything at all. Perhaps some of the independent traders who are coming in might sell you some furs for yourself—at a very good price. But the old Company stands pat and runs its affairs the way it used to. It doesn’t tell its secrets.”
The boys stood, hands in pockets now, toward the close of their interesting day at Chippewyan, looking in silence at the squared logs of the whitewashed Company buildings. A certain respect came into their minds.