The Wild North Land / The Story of a Winter Journey with Dogs across Northern North America

by Sir William Francis Butler

December passed away, the new year came, the cold became more intense. The snow deepened and the broad rivers lay hushed under their sparkling covering; wide roadways for our dog sleighs. At times there came a day of beautiful clearness, the sun shone brightly, the sky was of the deepest blue, and the earth sparkled in its spotless covering. At night the moon hung over the snow-wrapt river and silent pines with the brilliancy of a fairy scene; but many a day and night of storm and bitter tempest passed, and not unfrequently the thermometer placed against the hut wall marked full 70 degrees of frost.

Towards the end of the year four of our horses died, from the depth and hardness of the snow. The others would have soon followed if left to find their own sustenance, but a timely removal to the Fort à la Corne, twenty miles lower down the river, saved them.

When the year was drawing to its close two Indians pitched their lodge on the opposite side of the North River, and finding our stage pretty well stocked with food they began to starve immediately. In other words, it was easier to come to us for buffalo meat than to hunt deer for themselves: at all hours of the day they were with us, and frequently the whole family, two men, two squaws, and three children, would form a doleful procession to our hut for food. An Indian never knocks at a door; he lifts the latch, enters quietly, shakes hands with every one, and seats himself, without a word, upon the floor. You may be at breakfast, at dinner, or in bed, it doesn’t matter. If food be not offered to him, he will wait until the meal is finished, and then say that he has not eaten for so many hours, as the case may be. Our stock of food was not over sufficient, but it was impossible to refuse it to them even though they would not hunt for themselves; and when the three children were paraded—all pretty little things from four to seven years of age—the argument of course became irresistible.

It was useless to tell them that the winter was long, that no more buffalo could be obtained; they seemed to regard starvation as an ordinary event to be calculated upon, that as long as any food was to be obtained it was to be eaten at all times, and that when it was gone—well then the best thing was to do without it.

January drew to a close in very violent storms accompanied by great cold. Early one morning “At-tistighat,” or as we called him Bourgout No. 1, arrived with news that his brother had gone away two days before, that he had no blanket, no food; and that, as it had not been his intention to stay out, he concluded that he had perished. “At-tistighat” was a great scoundrel, but nevertheless, as the night had been one of terrible storm, we felt anxious for the safety of his brother, who was really a good Indian. “Go,” we said to him, “look for your brother; here is pemmican to feed you during your search.” He took the food, but coolly asserted that in all probability his brother had shot himself, and that consequently there was no use whatever in going to look for him; “or,” he said, “he is dead of cold, in which case it is useless to find him.”

While he spoke a footstep outside announced an arrival, the door opened, and the lost Bourgout No. 2 entered, bearing on his back a heavy load of venison.

At-tistighat’s line of argument was quite in keeping with the Indian character, and was laughable in its selfish logic. If the man was alive, he would find his own way home; if dead, there was nothing more to be done in the matter: but in any case pemmican was not to be despised.

But despite their habits of begging, and their frequently unseasonable visits, our Cree neighbours afforded us not a little food for amusement in the long winter evenings. Indian character is worth the study, if we will only take the trouble to divest ourselves of the notion that all men should be like ourselves. There is so much of simplicity and cunning, so much of close reasoning and child-like suspicion; so much natural quickness, sense of humour, credulousness, power of observation, faith and fun and selfishness, mixed up together in the Red man’s mental composition; that the person who will find nothing in Indian character worth studying will be likely to start from a base of nullity in his own brain system.

In nearly all the dealings of the white man with the red, except perhaps in those of the fur trade, as conducted by the great fur companies, the mistake of judging and treating Indians by European standards has been made. From the earliest ages of American discovery, down to the present moment, this error has been manifest; and it is this error which has rendered the whole missionary labour, the vast machinery set on foot by the charity and benevolence of the various religious bodies during so many centuries, a practical failure to-day.

When that Christian King Francis the First commissioned Cartier to convert the Indians, they were described in the royal edict as “men without knowledge of God, or use of reason;” and as the speediest mode of giving them one, and bringing them to the other, the Quebec chief savage was at once kidnapped, carried to France, baptized, and within six months was a dead man. We may wonder if his wild subjects had imbibed sufficient “reason” during the absence of the ship to realize during the following season the truth of what they were doubtless told, that it was better to be a dead Christian than a live savage; but no doubt, under the circumstances, they might be excused if they “didn’t quite see it.” Those who would imagine that the case of Menberton could not now occur in missionary enterprise are deceived.