1771. October.
{208} One of those strangers had about forty beaver skins, with which he intended to pay Matonabbee an old debt; but one of the other Indians seized the whole, notwithstanding he knew it to be in fact Matonabbee's property. This treatment, together with many other insults, which he had received during my abode with him, made him renew his old resolution of leaving his own country, and going to reside with the Athapuscow Indians.
1771. October.
As the most interesting part of my journey was now over, I did not think it necessary to interfere in his private affairs; and therefore did not endeavour to influence him either one way or the other: out of complaisance, therefore, rather than any thing else, I told him, that I thought such behaviour very uncourteous, especially in a man of his rank and dignity. As to the reason of his determination, I did not think it worth while to enquire into it; but, by his discourse with the other Indians, I soon understood that they all intended to make an excursion into the country of the Athapuscow Indians, in order to kill moose and beaver. The former of those animals are never found in the Northern Indian territories; and the latter are so scarce in those Northern parts, that during the whole Winter of one thousand seven hundred and seventy, {209} I did not see more than two beaver houses. Martins are also scarce in those parts; for during the above period, I do not think that more than six or eight were killed by all the Indians in my company. This exceedingly small number, among so many people, may with great truth be attributed to the indolence of the Indians, and the wandering life which they lead, rather than to the great scarcity of the martins. It is true, that our moving so frequently from place to place, did at times make it not an object worth while to build traps; but had they taken the advantage of all favourable opportunities, and been possessed of half the industry of the Company's servants in the Bay, they might with great ease have caught as many hundreds, if not some thousands; and when we consider the extent of ground which we walked over in that time, such a number would not have been any proof of the martins being very plentiful.
Except a few martins; wolves, quiquehatches, foxes, and otters, are the chief furrs to be met with in those parts, and few of the Northern Indians chuse to kill either the wolf or the quiquehatch, under a notion that they are something more than common animals. Indeed, I have known some of them so bigotted to this opinion, that having by chance killed a quiquehatch by a gun which had been set for a fox, they have left it where it was killed, and would not take off its skin. Notwithstanding this {210} silly notion, which is too frequently to be observed among those people, it generally happens that there are some in every gang who are less scrupulous, so that none of those furrs are ever left to rot; and even those who make a point of not killing the animals themselves, are ready to receive their skins from other Indians, and carry them to the Fort for trade.
30th.
November. 1st.
By the thirtieth of October, all our clothing, snowshoes, and temporary sledges, being completed, we once more began to prepare for moving, and on the following day set out, and walked five or six miles to the Southward.
5th.
1771. November.