A foraging expedition—Our hungry camp—A welcome feast—Dogs, sleds and buffalo bull in a tangle—In a Wood Cree encampment—Chief Child, Maskepetoon and Ka-kake—Indian hospitality—Incidents of the return trip.
About the middle of January we started for the plains to find the Indians, and, if possible, secure provisions and fresh meat from them. William and Neils, with horses and sleds, preceded us some days. Williston and I in the meantime went for the last load of fish, then we followed our men out to the great plains. In those days travelling with horses was tedious. You had to give the animals time to forage in the snow, or they would not stand the trip. From forty to sixty miles per day would be ordinary progress for dogs and drivers, but from ten to twenty would be enough for horses in the deep snow and cold of winter; thus it came to pass that, although William and Neils had preceded us some days, nevertheless we camped with them our second night out, close beside an old buffalo pound which had been built by the Indians.
It was said by the old Indians that if you took the wood of a pound for your camp-fire, a storm would be the result; and as we did take of the wood that night, a storm came sure enough, and William's horses were far away next morning. As we had but little provisions, Williston and I did not wait, but leaving the most of our little stock of dried meat with the horse party, we went on in the storm, and keeping at it all day, made a considerable distance in a south-easterly direction, where we hoped to fall in with Indians or buffaloes, or possibly a party bent on the same errand as ourselves from the sister mission at Whitefish Lake.
That night both men and dogs ate sparingly, for the simple reason that we did not have any more to eat. In these northern latitudes a night in January in the snow with plenty of food is, under the best of circumstances, a hardship; but when both tired men and faithful dogs are on "short commons" the gloom seems darker, the cold keener, the loneliness greater than usual. At any rate, that is how Williston and I felt the night I refer to. The problem was clear on the blackboard before us as we sat and vainly tried to think it out, for there was very little talking round our camp-fire that night. The known quantities were: an immense stretch of unfamiliar country before us; deep, loose snow everywhere around us; our food all gone; both of us in a large measure "tenderfeet." The unknown: Where were the friendly Indians and the buffaloes, and where was food to be found? But being tired and young we went to sleep, and with the morning star were waiting for the daylight in a more hopeful condition of mind.
Driving on in the drifting snow, about 10 a.m. we came upon a fresh track of dog-sleds going in our direction. This, then, must be the party from Whitefish Lake. The thought put new life both into us and our dogs. Closely watching the trail, which was being drifted over very fast by the loose snow, we hurried on, and soon came to where these people had camped the night before. Pushing on, we came up to them about the middle of the afternoon. They turned out to be Peter Erasmus and some Indians from Whitefish Lake Mission; but, alas for our hopes of food, like ourselves they were without provisions. However, we drove on as fast as we could, and had the supreme satisfaction of killing a buffalo cow just before sundown that same evening. Very soon the animal was butchered and on our sleds, and finding a suitable clump of timber, we camped for the night. Making a good large camp-fire, very soon we were roasting and boiling and eating buffalo meat, to the great content of our inner man. What a contrast our camp this night to that of the previous one! Then, hunger and loneliness and considerable anxiety; now, feasting and anecdote and joke and fun. Our dogs, also, were in better spirits.
There was one drawback—we had no salt. My companion Williston had left what little we had in one of our camps. He pretended he did not care for salt, and he and the others laughed at me because I longed for it so much. The fresh meat was good, but "Oh, if I only had some salt!" was an oft-repeated expression from my lips. Later we fell in with old Ben Sinclair, who sympathized with me very much, and rummaging in the dirty, grimy sack in which he carried his tobacco and moccasins and mending material, he at last brought up a tiny bit of salt tied up in the corner of a small rag, saying: "My wife Magened, he very good woman, he put that there; you may have it;" and thankful I was for the few grains of salt. As Williston had lost ours, and had laughed at me for mourning over the loss, and especially as the few grains old Ben gave me would not admit of it, I did not offer him a share, but made my little portion last for the rest of that journey.
Six hungry, hard-travelled men and twenty-four hungrier and also harder-travelled dogs left very little of that buffalo cow (though a big and fat animal) to carry out of the camp. Supper, or several suppers, for six men and twenty-four dogs, and then breakfast for six men, and the cow was about gone; but now we had pretty good hope of finding more. This we did as we journeyed on, and at the end of two days' travel we sighted the smoke of a large camp of Indians.
"The dogs and sleds went sliding in around him."