The name of McKenzie (Hon. Roderick McKenzie) was one to conjure by among the fur-traders. From the fact that there were so many well-known partners and clerks of this name arose the custom, very common in the Highland communities, of giving nicknames to distinguish them. Four of the McKenzies were "Le Rouge," "Le Blanc," "Le Borgne" (one-eyed), and "Le Picoté" (pock-marked). Sir Alexander was the most notable, and after him his cousin, the Hon. Roderick, of whom we write.
This distinguished man came out as a Highland laddie from Scotland in 1784. He at once entered the service of the fur company, and made his first journey to the North-West in the next year. His voyage from Ste. Anne, on Montreal Island, up the fur-traders' route, was taken in Gregory McLeod & Co.'s service. At Grand Portage McKenzie was initiated into the mysteries of the partners. Pushed into the North-West, he soon became prominent, and built the most notable post of the upper country, Fort Chipewyan.
On his marriage he became allied to a number of the magnates of the fur company. His wife belonged to the popular family of Chaboillez, two other daughters of which were married, one to the well-known Surveyor-General of Lower Canada, Joseph Bouchette, and another to Simon McTavish, "Le Marquis."
Roderick McKenzie was a man of some literary ability and taste. He proposed at one time writing a history of the Indians of the North-West and also of the North-West Company. In order to do this, he sent circulars to leading traders, and thus receiving a number of journals, laid the foundation of the literary store from which ex-Governor Masson prepared his book on the bourgeois.
Between him and his cousin, Sir Alexander Mackenzie, an extensive correspondence was kept up. Extracts from the letters of the distinguished partner form the burden of the "Reminiscences" published by Masson. Many of the facts have been referred to in our sketch of Sir Alexander Mackenzie's voyages.
For eight long years Roderick McKenzie remained in the Indian country, and came to Canada in 1797. Some two years afterward Sir Alexander Mackenzie left the old Company and headed the X Y Company. At that time Roderick McKenzie was chosen in the place of his cousin in the North-West Company, and this for several years caused a coolness between them.
His "Reminiscences" extend to 1829, at which time he was living in Terrebonne, in Lower Canada. He became a member of the Legislative Council in Lower Canada, and he has a number of distinguished descendants. Roderick McKenzie closes his interesting "Reminiscences" with an elaborate and valua ble list of the proprietors, clerks, interpreters, &c., of the North-West Company in 1799, giving their distribution in the departments, and the salary paid each. It gives us a picture of the magnitude of the operations of the North-West Company.
TALES OF THE NORTH-WEST.
Few of the Nor'-Westers aimed at collecting and preserving the folk-lore of the natives. At the request of Roderick McKenzie, George Keith, a bourgeois who spent a great part of his life very far North, viz. in the regions of Athabasca, Mackenzie River, and Great Bear Lake, sent a series of letters extending from 1807 onward for ten years embodying tales, descriptions, and the history of the Indian tribes of his district. His first description is that of the Beaver Indians, of whom he gives a vocabulary. He writes for us a number of tales of the Beaver Indians, viz. "The Indian Hercules," "Two Lost Women," "The Flood, a Tale of the Mackenzie River," and "The Man in the Moon." One letter gives a good account of the social manners and customs of the Beaver Indians, and another a somewhat complete description of the Rocky Mountains and Mackenzie River country. Descriptions of the Filthy Lake and Grand River Indians and the Long Arrowed Indians, with a few more letters with reference to the fur trade, make up the interesting collection. George Keith may be said to have wielded the "pen of a ready writer." We give his story of
THE MAN IN THE MOON.