May 20th.—Arrived at the Forks Red River (present city of Winnipeg) about noon.
May 24th.—Arrived at the Lake (Winnipeg) at 10 a.m.
May 27th.—Arrived at the Sieur's Fort (Fort Alexander at the mouth of Winnipeg River).
McDonnell also gives in his journal a number of particulars about the Cree and Assiniboine Indians, describing their religion, marriages, dress, dances, and mourning. The reader is struck with the difference in the recital by different traders of the lives lived by them. The literary faculty is much more developed in some cases than in others, and John McDonnell was evidently an observing and quick-witted man. He belonged to a U. E. Loyalist Scottish family that took a good position in the affairs of early Canada.
A FULL AND INTERESTING AUTOBIOGRAPHY.
That the first trader of the North-West whom we have described, Alexander Henry, should have been followed in the North-West fur trade by his nephew, Alexander Henry, Jr., is in itself a thing of interest; but that the younger Henry should have left us a most voluminous and entertaining journal is a much greater matter.
The copy of this journal is in the Parliamentary Library at Ottawa, and forms two large bound folio volumes of 1,642 pages. It is not the original, but is a well-approved copy made in 1824 by George Coventry, of Montreal. For many years this manuscript has been in the Parliamentary Library, and extracts have been made and printed. Recently an American writer, Dr. Coues, who has done good service in editing the notable work of Lewis and Clark, and also that of Zebulon S. Pike, has published a digest of Henry's journal and added to it very extensive notes of great value. The greatest praise is due to this author for the skill with which he has edited the journal, and all students of the period are indebted to one so well fitted to accomplish the task.
The journal opens, in 1799, with Henry on the waters of a tributary of Lake Manitoba, he having arrived from Grand Portage by the usual fur traders' route. In this place he built a trading house and spent his first winter. In the following year the trader is found on the Red River very near the forty-ninth parallel of north latitude, and is engaged in establishing a post at the mouth of the Pembina River, a tributary of Red River. At this post Henry remains until 1808, going hither and thither in trading expeditions, establishing new outposts, counter-working the rival traders of the X Y Company, and paying his visits from time to time to Grand Portage.
Henry's entries are made with singular clearness and realistic force. He recites with the utmost frankness the details of drunken debauchery among the Indians, the plots of one company to outdo the other in trading with the Indians, and the tricks of trade so common at this period in the fur trade.