What is girl life like in newer Canada—in lands to which so many of our brothers are going just now? This article—written in the Far North-West—supplies the answer.
If you leave out France, Canada is as large as all Europe; which means that the girls of our Dominion live under climatic, domestic, and social conditions that are many and varied. It is of the girls in the newer provinces I shall write—those provinces known as "North-West Canada"—who reside in the country adjacent to some town or village.
It is true that many girls who come here with their fathers and mothers often live a long distance from a town or even a railroad.
Where I live at Edmonton, the capital of the Province of Alberta, almost every day in the late winter we see girls starting off to the Peach River district, which lies to the north several hundred miles from a railroad.
A Travelling House
How do they travel? You could never guess, so I may as well tell you. They travel in a house—a one-roomed house. It is built on a sled and furnished with a stove, a table that folds against the wall, a cupboard for food and dishes, nails for clothing, and a box for toilet accessories. Every available inch is stored with supplies, so that every one must perforce sleep on the floor. This family bed is, however, by no means uncomfortable, for the "soft side of the board" is piled high with fur rugs and four-point blankets. (Yes, if you remind me I'll tell you by and by what a "four-point" blanket is.)
The entrance to the house is from the back, and the window is in front, through a slide in which the lines extend to the heads of the horses or the awkward, stumbling oxen.
You must not despise the oxen, or say, "A pretty, team for a Canadian girl!" for, indeed, they are most reliable animals, and not nearly so delicate as horses, nor so hard to feed—and they never, never run away. Besides—and here's the rub—you can always eat the oxen should you ever want to, and popular prejudice does not run in favour of horseflesh.
Oh, yes! I said I would tell you about "four-point" blankets. They are the blankets that have been manufactured for nearly three hundred years by "the Honourable Company of Gentlemen Adventurers of England trading into Hudson's Bay," known for the sake of conciseness as the "H.B. Company." These blankets are claimed to be the best in the world, and weigh from eight to ten pounds. The Indians, traders, trappers, boatmen, and pioneers in the North use no others. They are called "four-point" because of four black stripes at one corner. There are lighter blankets of three and a half points, which points are indicated in the same way. By these marks an Indian knows exactly what value he is getting in exchange for his precious peltry.
After travelling for three or four weeks in this gipsy fashion, mayhap getting a peep at a moose, a wolf, or even a bear (to say nothing of such inconsequential fry as ermine, mink, beaver, and otter), the family arrive at their holding of 160 acres.