LOGGING SCENE. ROGER CONANT IN DARLINGTON, CO. DURHAM, UPPER CANADA, 1778.
BARCLAY, CLARK & CO. LITHO. TORONTO
First he came as a young Indian brave, before he became chief, and, on attaining the chieftainship and a wife, the only difference which the few white settlers here at that time could discover in his attire was that his deerskin leggings were more beautifully fringed at the seams, and his moccasins likewise were more elaborately wrought with porcupine quills.
Waubakosh was never known to commit a mean act. He was always friendly, and every succeeding fall his coming back was looked for with certainty by the white settlers, who got their living in the clearings and from the waters, as much hunters and fishermen as farmers.
On bidding his white friends good-bye, about December, 1847, as he set out for the Indian encampment about Nottawasaga, in the thick woods, the Indian chief expressed the fear that he might never come back again. His fears were only too well founded, for he never did return. Old residents who knew him have been heard many times to wonder what was his ultimate fate. More strange still to say, not one of his tribe ever came back again to lodge any length of time. A noble-looking red man, he has been described as tall and straight, with a good face and a pleasant eye—in very truth, one of Nature’s noblemen.
Many of his companions who predeceased him were buried near his camping-place on Lake Ontario. Their tomahawks, beads, flints, spears, ornaments, and buttons, and their skulls as well, have been found in recent years by those seeking for traces of the aboriginal red man.
As a means of money making, next to the fur trading in Upper Canada came the making of potash. Ashes were about in plenty, and were easily gathered from the burnt heaps of logs.
In the illustration facing [page 97] the artist has endeavored to show the intense heat required. The fire about the kettle is blazing furiously. This is the “melting scene,” and the last firing before the potash will be done. The driest and most inflammable wood was needed to secure the great heat that was necessary.
Potash, from 1800 to about 1840, brought some $40 per barrel in Upper Canada, and with the fur trading helped to make wealth for my grandsire and others.