The Great Lone Land / A Narrative of Travel and Adventure in the North-West of America

by Sir William Francis Butler

CHAPTER NINETEEN.

I start from Edmonton with Dogs--Dog-travelling--The Cabri Sack--A Cold Day--Victoria--"Sent to Rome"--Reach Fort Pitt--The blind Cree--A Feast or a Famine--Death of Pe-na-koam the Blackfoot.

I was now making my way back to Edmonton, with the intention of there exchanging my horses for dogs, and then endeavouring to make the return journey to Red River upon the ice of the River Saskatchewan. Dog travelling was a novelty. The cold had more than reached the limit at which the saddle is a safe mode of travel, and the horses suffered so much in pawing away the snow to get within reach of the grass lying underneath, that I longed to exchange them for the train of dogs, the painted cariole, and little baggage-sled. It took me four days to complete the arrangements necessary for my new journey; and, on the afternoon of the 20th December, I set out upon a long journey, with dogs, down the valley of the Saskatchewan. I little thought then of the distance before me; of the intense cold through which I was destined to travel during two entire months of most rigorous winter; how day by day the frost was to harden, the snow to deepen, all nature to sink more completely under the breath of the ice-king. And it was well that all this was hidden from me at the time, or perhaps I should have been tempted to remain during the winter at Edmonton, until the spring had set free once more the rushing waters of the Saskatchewan.

Behold me then on the 20th of December starting from Edmonton with three trains of dogs--one to carry myself, the other two to drag provisions, baggage, and blankets and all the usual paraphernalia of winter travel. The cold which, with the exception of a few nights severe frost, had been so long-delayed now seemed determined to atone for lost time by becoming suddenly intense. On the night of the 21st December we reached, just at dusk, a magnificent clump of large pine-trees on the right bank of the river. During the afternoon the temperature had fallen below zero; a keen wind blew along-the frozen river, and the dogs and men were glad to clamber up the steep clayey bank into the thick shelter of the pine bluff', amidst whose dark-green recesses a huge fire was quickly alight. While here we sit in the ruddy blaze: of immense dry pine logs it will be well to say a few words on dogs and dog driving.

Dogs in the territories of the North-west have but one function--to haul. Pointer, setter, lurcher, foxhound, greyhound, Indian mongrel, miserable cur or beautiful Esquimaux, all alike are destined to pull a sled of some kind or other during, the months of snow and ice: all are destined to howl under the driver's lash; to tug wildly at the moose-skin collar; to drag until they can drag no more, and then to die. At what age a dog is put to haul I could never satisfactorily ascertain, but I have seen dogs doing some kind of hauling long be fore the peculiar expression of the puppy had left their countenances. Speaking now with the experience of nearly fifty days of dog travelling, and the knowledge of some twenty different trains of dogs of all sizes, ages, and degrees, watching them closely on the track and in the camp during 1300 miles of travel, I may claim, I think, some right to assert that I possess no inconsiderable insight into the habits, customs, and thoughts (for a dog thinks far better than many of his masters) of the hauling dog. When I look back again upon the long list of "Whiskies," "Brandies," "Chocolats," "Corbeaus," "Tigres," "Tete Noirs," "Cerf Volants," "Pilots," "Capitaines," "Cariboos," "muskymotes," "Coffees," and "Nichinassis" who individually and collectively did their best to haul me and my baggage over that immense waste of snow and ice, what a host of sadly resigned faces rises up in the dusky light of the fire! faces seared by whip-mark and blow of stick, faces mutely conscious that that master for whom the dog gives up every thing in this life was treating him in a most brutal manner. I do not for an instant mean to assert that these dogs were not, many of them, great rascals and rank imposters; but Just as slavery produces certain vices in the slave which it would be unfair to hold him accountable for, so does this perversion of the dog from his true use to that of a beast of burthen produce in endless variety traits of cunning and deception in the hauling-dog. To be a thorough expert in dog-training a man must be able to imprecate freely and with considerable variety in at least three different languages. But whatever number of tongues the driver may speak, one is indispensable to perfection in the art, and that is French: curses seem useful adjuncts in any language, but curses delivered in French will get a train of dogs through or over any thing. There is a good story told which illustrates this peculiar feature in dog-training. It is said that a high dignitary of the Church was once making a winter tour through his missions in the North-west. The driver, out of deference for his freight's profession, abstained from the use of forcible language to his dogs, and the hauling was very indifferently performed. Soon the train came to the foot of a hill, and notwithstanding all the efforts of the driver with whip and stick the dogs were unable to draw the cariole to the summit.

"Oh," said the Church dignitary, "this is not at all as good a train of dogs as the one you drove last year; why, they are unable to pull me up this hill!"

"No, monseigneur," replied the owner of the dogs, "but I am driving them differently; if you will only permit me to drive them in the old way you will see how easily they will pull the cariole to the top of this hill; they do not understand my new method."

"By all means," said the bishop; "drive them then in the usual manner."

Instantly there rang out a long string of "sacré chien," "sacré diable," and still more unmentionable phrases. The effect-upon the dogs was magical; the cariole flew to the summit; the progress of the episcopal tour was undeniably expedited, and a-practical exposition was given of the poet's thought, "From seeming evil still aducing good."