Very Perplexing Interviews with Little Bill.
Things in the colony had at this time come to what may be styled a complicated pass, for distress and starvation were rampant on the one hand, while on the other hand the weather was superb, giving prospect at last of a successful harvest.
The spring buffalo-hunt had been but partially successful, so that a number of the buffalo runners had to make arrangements to support themselves by fishing during the autumn in lakes Winnipeg and Manitoba.
In these great fresh-water seas there is an unlimited quantity of rich and finely flavoured whitefish, or Titameg, besides other fish. But Titameg are only to be caught in large quantities during autumn, and of course much of the success of fishing depends on weather—one gale sometimes visiting the fishermen with ruin—ruin all the more complete that the nets which may be carried away have in many cases to be paid for out of the produce of the season’s fishing.
In addition to the buffalo-hunters, who were obliged to support themselves by fishing, there was a large number of idle half-breeds, of a much lower type than these plain hunters, who had to betake themselves to the same pursuit. These were the “ne’er-do-weels” of the colony; men who, like La Certe, with more or less—usually less—of his good-nature, seemed to hold that all the industrious people in the world were created to help or to support them and their families. Of course when the industrious people were unsuccessful, these idlers were obliged to work for their living, which, being unaccustomed to do anything energetic, they found it hard and difficult to do, and generally regarded themselves as the harshly used victims of a tyrannous fate.
There was one thing, however, at which these idlers were very expert and diligent—they begged well, and with persistency. No wonder; for their lives often depended on their persistent and successful begging. The Company and the private storekeepers were always more or less willing to risk their goods by advancing them on credit. Before the summer was over, most of these people had got their supplies and were off to the fishing grounds, regardless of the future, with large quantities of tea and tobacco, and happy as kings are said to be—but never are, if history be true!
Among these, of course, was La Certe. That typical idler had made the most of his misfortunes. Everybody had heard what the Sioux had done to him, and everybody had pitied him. Pity opens the heart, and that opens the hand; and, when the poor man entered a store with the polite manner of a French Canadian and the humble aspect of a ruined man, he scarcely required to beg. One man lent him a tent. Another lent him a canoe. From the Company’s store at Fort Garry he received a fair outfit of nearly all that he could require. Further down the Settlement there was a private store-keeper with a jovial countenance.
“O it was a sad, sad sight!” he said to this man on entering the store—“so very sad to see my tent in ashes, and nothing left—nothing—absolutely!” The jovial man was moved. He gave La Certe what he asked for—even pressed things on him, and also bestowed on him a considerable “gratuity.”
Still further down the Settlement the unfortunate man found the store, or shop, of another friend. This man was saturnine of countenance, but moderately liberal of heart. La Certe approached him with an air so pitiful that the saturnine man melted like snow in the sunshine or wax under heat.
“I have heard of your loss,” he said, “and I will give you credit this time, La Certe, though you are so bad at paying your debts. But I won’t give you much.”