The Perils and Adventures of Harry Skipwith Part 14

We might have proceeded by a more direct route--through Lake Winnepegosis--to the mouth of the Great Saskatchewan, but we wished to navigate the large lake from one end to the other. We accomplished all we proposed in five days--reached the mouth of the rapid and gold-bearing Great Saskatchewan. Near the entrance is a long and fierce rapid, which it was necessary for us to mount, before we could again reach water on which we could navigate our canoes. It is nearly two miles in length. The water from above comes on smoothly and steadily; then, suddenly, as if stimulated to action by some sudden impulse, it begins to leap and foam and roll onward till it forms fierce and tumultuous surges, increasing in size till they appear like the rolling billows of a tempestuous sea, ready to engulf any boat venturing over them. In the one case, on the ocean, the movement is caused by the wind above; in the present instance by that of the water itself pa.s.sing over an incline of rough rocks beneath.

Having partly unladen our canoes, leaving two men in alone, one to steer and the other to fend off the rocks, the rest of us harnessed ourselves to the end of a long tow line, with straps round our bodies, and commenced tracking them up the rapid along a path at the top of the cliffs. It was very hard work, as we had to run and leap and scramble along the slippery and jagged rocks alongside the cataract.

It was curious to know that we were still in the very heart of a vast continent, and yet to be navigating a river upwards of half-a-mile in width. After proceeding twenty miles we pa.s.sed through Cross Lake, and soon afterwards entered Cedar Lake, which is thirty miles long and twenty broad. We had now to proceed for some hundred miles up this. .h.i.therto little-known river, which, rising in the Rocky Mountains, is navigable very nearly the whole distance from their base. As we were sailing we were agreeably surprised, on turning a point, to see before us on the right bank of the river, in the midst of fields of waving corn, a somewhat imposing church, whose tall spire, gilt by the last rays of the evening sun, was mirrored in the gliding river; a comfortable looking parsonage; a large and neat school-house, and several other dwelling-houses and cottages. This proved to be the Pas Mission, one of the many supported by the Church Missionary Society.

Here we were most liberally and hospitably received. Above it is Fort c.u.mberland, a trading post of the Hudson's Bay Company. An upward voyage of a hundred and fifty miles, aided by a strong breeze, brought us to Fort a la Carne, another Hudson's Bay Company's post, where we found Stalker and our carts, and were joined by Pierre Garoupe, who had come across the country from Red River with a further supply of provisions and stores.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN.

THE WINTER IN CAMP--OUR LOG-HOUSE AND HUTS--HUNTING AND FIs.h.i.+NG--BUFFALO STALKING--SUPPER AND A DANCE, AND SUPPER AGAIN--HOW WE FARED IN CAMP-- INDIAN STALKING--WINTER PASTIME.

We found that although the weather was still very warm in the day-time, that the comparatively short summer of those regions was already too far advanced to allow of our pus.h.i.+ng our way across the Rocky Mountains in the present wild state of the country; a feat, however, which my friend Paul Kane performed some years ago; but then boats were in waiting on the upper branch of the Columbia to convey him and his party to the south. We therefore agreed to employ ourselves in hunting, and in preparing our winter quarters till it was time to go into them. As I have already described a summer buffalo hunt, I will pa.s.s over those we at this time engaged in, and proceed to an account of our life in the winter.

Our canoes and such articles as we no longer required we exchanged for horses--such as were likely to prove of value to us in our onward journey in the spring. We had selected a beautiful spot near a lake and in the neighbourhood of a tribe of peaceably-disposed Indians, for the erection of our residence, about fifty miles from the forts; and we now set out for it, with our carts, horses, stores, and cattle in the true patriarchal style, only the women and children were fortunately wanting.

Having reached our location we pitched our tents, and having unpacked such provisions and goods as we required for our immediate use, placed the carts together, and covered the whole with tarpaulins. Our horses we turned out, as they would be able to exist through the whole winter, sheltered by the woods, and feeding on the rich gra.s.s which they could get at by digging with their noses under the snow. Our first business was then to cut down the trees necessary for the erection of our abodes.

We all took axes in our hands, and in the course of a couple of days had trees enough felled for our purpose. There they lay around in all directions, but it puzzled Trevor and Peter not a little to say how they were to be made to answer the purpose of sheltering us during a winter of almost arctic severity. John Stalker was the chief builder, and I was architect; that is to say, I designed the plan of the buildings, and he directed the way in which they were to be put up, while the rest of the party lopped off the branches and dragged the logs up to the spot.

I had studied the way to construct a log-house while recovering from the wounds I received in our skirmish with the Comanches, and now I found an opportunity of turning my knowledge to account. The chief residence was to be oblong; so we cut two long and two short trunks, making deep scores at each end that they might fit into each other. Above these were placed others also scored at the ends, till four thick walls had been erected about seven feet high, without a roof and without doors and windows. Trevor looked at it with astonishment, and Peter walked round and round it till, stopping short near the builder, he remarked--

"Well, Master Stalker, that's a rum house! I'll be bold to ask, are we to be shut up all winter, so that we don't want a door to go in and out at? And is it so dark that we don't want a window to see out of?"

"Wait a bit, and you'll see what we'll do, lad," answered Stalker, laughing. "Light enough, day and night, when the snow's on the ground; and you'll be as much out of doors as in doors when the sky's clear."

Peter waited and wondered, for Stalker insisted on getting up all the walls of the huts before proceeding to other portions of the work.

Besides ours, in which were to be deposited the stores for greater safety, there were to be two of smaller size for the men. The walls, when only thus far completed, looked in no way fitted to keep out the cold, as we could see through the interstices on every side. "Wait a bit," was Stalker's remark. "Now, lads, some on you go and dig the stiffest clay you can find, and others chop up some gra.s.s." This order was speedily obeyed, and, with a mixture formed of the two, every cranny was completely stopped up; and in the inside the walls were made so perfectly smooth that the logs were almost concealed. "There!"

exclaimed Stalker, as he surveyed his work; "I doubt if Jack Frost, though he is pretty sharp in these parts, will ever get through that."

With their hatchets, he and two of the other men literally chopped out a doorway and a window in each hut. The doors were formed from some boards taken from the carts, and the windows with sheets of parchment nailed tightly over the aperture, so that they served the double purpose of drums and windows. As yet there were no roofs; but the men had been set to work to cut a number of tall, thin young pine-trees, which served as rafters placed close together, while a quant.i.ty of marsh gra.s.s, over which was spread a heavy layer of clay, formed a thatch which no storm could remove.

We began to talk of putting up our bedsteads, and making ourselves comfortable inside our huts.

"Not much comfort you'll get by-and-by, gentlemen, if you was not to do something more than you have done," observed Stalker.

"What can that be?" asked Trevor.

"I'm sure I don't know," muttered Peter. "To my mind the houses are pretty comfortable for poor men, though not much for gentlemen like master and Mr Trevor."

"I guess Jack Frost would pretty soon remind you when he comes,"

observed Stalker, with a grin.

"_Ma foi_!" exclaimed Pierre Garoupe. "Monsieur Jaque Frost make his way through de key-hole."

"Oh, how stupid--a fire-place!" I cried out.

"That's it," cried Stalker. "And now let's set about it."

I suggested that, instead of the ordinary clay of which fire-places are built, that ours should be constructed of stone of which there was no lack, in the shape of boulders, near the lake. These we collected in the carts, and by cementing them by mortar supported by a frame of wood outside, we formed a substantial fire-place and chimney suited for such a fire as we expected to require. By Stalker's advice we sunk the floor three feet deep, and piled the earth we dug up outside; thus adding much to the warmth of our abode. A trench was also dug outside, at some little distance, to take off any water which, during a casual thaw, might be inclined to run in. Then, to keep off the wind--the primary object--any grizzlies which might be wandering our way, or any Indians who might prove hostile, we surrounded our whole station with a strong palisade, so that it was almost as strong as one of the Company's Posts.

Never sleep on the ground. To obviate that necessity we stuck some short posts into the ground, and on them formed a framework, over which we stretched some buffalo hides, and so got first-rate bedsteads.

Trevor laughed at me for what he called my effeminacy, but I suggested that, after a hunting tramp of thirty or forty miles, we might not be sorry to turn into a comfortable bed. Our lads' labour was stacking all the wood we had cut for burning, and then storing our goods and provisions. We put off making the furniture for our huts till we should be kept in by bad weather. A further supply of firewood could also be procured at any time after the snow covered the ground. Writers of romances make their heroes and heroines wonderfully independent of food and rest; but we, being ordinary mortals, were aware that we could not exist in comfort without a good supply of provisions, and Trevor and I therefore formed two parties of the men--one to remain in charge of the huts to fish, and to cure what they caught, besides trapping or shooting any animals; while the other was to accompany us in search of buffalo and any other game to be found.

Scarcely were our arrangements completed when the snow fell, and all nature a.s.sumed her wintry garb, not to be put off till the following spring.

Trevor and I, with John Stalker, Swiftfoot, and two other Indians, formed the hunting party. We first constructed four horse-sleighs to carry the flesh of the buffaloes we intended to kill, each dragged by a single horse. We were all mounted, also, on small, but active and hardy steeds, with our blankets, cloaks, tin-cups, pemmican, tea and sugar, and a few other articles, strapped to our saddles. We each had our rifles, axes, and hunting-knives, while an iron pot and a frying-pan were the only articles in our camp equipage. The snow, however thick, was no impediment to our horses in finding their food, for, without difficulty, they dug down through it with their noses till they reached the rich dry gra.s.s beneath, which seems, thus, in this apparently inhospitable region, to be preserved for their especial use. We found that horses, cattle, and pigs lived out through the winter without any charge being taken of them, except towards the end of spring, when an occasional thaw melts the surface of the snow, which, freezing again at night, forms so hard a crust that even their tough mouths cannot break through it.

We had no tents or covering beyond our cloaks and blankets. As night approached we camped near some copse of willow or birch, which would afford us wood for our fires--rarely even putting up a screen of birch-bark which would shelter us from the icy blast. With a fire in the centre, as large as we could keep up, we lay in a circle, our feet towards it, and our bodies, like the spokes of a wheel, wrapped in our blankets, and our heads on our saddles. This was our most luxurious style of camping. At other times we were not nearly so well off, as I shall have to recount.

We had travelled about a hundred miles south of our station over a hilly, well-watered, and well-wooded country, which must, in summer, be highly picturesque, when Stalker announced, from the traces he had seen in the snow, that buffalo were near. We, therefore, immediately camped, but dared not light a fire for fear of frightening the animals, so we had to make a meal off dry pemmican and biscuit, washed down with rum and water--very sustaining food, at all events. In winter the buffalo must be stalked like deer, and cannot be ridden down as in summer, when the hard ground allows the horses to approach at full gallop. We consequently left our horses and rugs and cooking utensils--and, indeed, everything that would enc.u.mber us--in camp, under charge of the two Indians, and advanced on foot. We had to keep to leeward and to conceal ourselves behind any bush or inequality of ground we could find. "Too many cooks spoil the broth"--too many sportsmen do the same thing, or rather lose it altogether. We advanced cautiously enough, when once we got sight of the herd, for about two miles or more, each man taking up his station properly; but it had not been arranged who should fire first, or when each person should fire. There appeared directly before me a dozen or more fine bulls, rather too far for a certain aim. I was creeping on slowly and cautiously to get a better aim, when one of the party, in his eagerness, showed himself. We all said it was Peter, and scolded him accordingly, for off set the buffaloes at full gallop. Then we all let fly at the ends they exposed to us; but not a shot took effect, and we soon afterwards met in the open s.p.a.ce, where they had been, looking very foolish at each other. Peter bore his scolding without complaining, and our good humour was restored when Stalker a.s.sured us that we were sure to come up with the animals if we did not mind a good walk. Were we not bold hunters? so of course we did not, and off we set.

We trudged on for many a long mile, when Stalker called a halt, and told us that we were again close to the herd, on their leeside, and that if we were cautious we should certainly bag some game. We had spent two or three hours gaining our present position; evening was coming on, and if we did not kill some beasts now, we might miss them altogether. This made us more than usually anxious, as we crept on towards the unconscious animals, which kept busily cropping their afternoon meal.

Now I saw one of them look up. Something had startled him. He communicated his fears to the rest. I was certain that in another moment they would be off. One of them, a fine bull, turned his shoulder towards me. The opportunity was not to be lost. I fired. The animal dashed on with the rest. I thought that I must have missed him; but in a few seconds he stopped, rolled over, and his life-blood stained the pure snow. Three other shots were fired in quick succession, two of them followed by the fall of an animal; at considerable distances, however, from each other. We pursued the rest, eager for more. We were hunting for the pot--indeed, our very existence might depend on what we should kill; but, after a hard run of a mile or more, the rest of the buffaloes broke from us and scampered off into the boundless prairie.

We now called a bait, and came to the conclusion that, if we did not hurry back, we should find but a Flemish account of the animals we had already killed, as that moment the howl of wolves struck on our ear, telling us that they had scented out the carca.s.ses. Though they are much less ferocious than are those of Siberia and Russia, they have equally large appet.i.tes, and we knew that they would have no respect for our requirements of winter provender. We therefore divided parties.

One half to remain by the animals last killed, while the others, that is to say, Peter and I, went back to the spot where I had killed the bull.

We ran as fast as we could over the snow, and were only just in time to scare away a whole herd which was about to make an onslaught on our property; for so, in that region, the hunter considers every animal he kills, a point disputed only by the wolves, who believe themselves to possess an equal right to it.

We now began to reflect seriously how we were to pa.s.s the night. We had left our blankets and cloaks at our camp, and the thermometer, if we had possessed one, would have sunk below zero. Wood was scarce, and shelter of any sort there was none, as the snow was not deep enough to dig a hole in it, cold comfort even as that would have been. We espied a copse of arbor-vitae, the close foliage covered pretty well with snow, at a distance, near a small pond, and from it we collected dry sticks sufficient only for a small fire. Having lighted it, we commenced skinning the buffalo, taking his hump and tongue for our supper, intending to broil the one and bake the other in a coat of clay. I had a little tea in my pocket, and Peter had a tin mug, in which we managed to melt some snow and boil it sufficiently to infuse the fragrant herb; but, in spite of the warm beverage and hot meat, which we relished, we felt the cold bitterly. To keep off the chilling blast we sc.r.a.ped the snow up into a circular wall. I then bethought me of the buffalo skin, of which we soon denuded the beast, dragged it to our fire, and crept under it. How warm and cozy we found it! and all our fears for our comfort during the night vanished. Having made up the fire, with our rifles by our sides, we went to sleep. I was awoke by a sensation of cold, and hearing Peter exclaim--

"Oh, sir, I wonder what has come over the buffalo skin?"

On sitting up I found that the lately soft and warm hide had formed a frozen arch over us, as hard as iron, and that our fire was nearly out.

We could do nothing but spring to our feet, make up the fire, and then jump about before it to restore the circulation. Though this employment was satisfactory for a time we began, at length, to find it very irksome and fatiguing, and it seemed impossible to keep it up the whole night, yet I could think of no other way of escaping being frozen to death.

Peter proposed, as a variety, that we should eat some more beef and drink some more tea, a bright idea, to which I acceded; and when that midnight meal was over, we took to dancing again. We knew that Trevor and his party would be as badly off, and we only hoped that they would have thought of similar means of keeping body and soul together. Peter diversified the amus.e.m.e.nt by singing and playing all sorts of antics, while I contemplated the stars overhead; but instead of rest we only became more and more fatigued, and I was truly glad when at length the wolves set up a hideous chorus, announcing the approach of dawn. A superst.i.tious man, unaccustomed to the sound, might have supposed them to be a band of evil spirits, compelled at the return of the bright luminary of the day to revisit their abodes of darkness.

Having eaten so many suppers we had no appet.i.te for breakfast, and instead of taking any we cut up the carca.s.ses ready for the sleighs which Trevor was to send Swiftfoot to fetch. They arrived at length, when we found that our friends had pa.s.sed the night exactly as we had done. The beef being sufficient only partly to fill the sleighs, Trevor and Stalker set off in search of more buffalo, while we followed slowly, intending to return to the camp in the evening. The result was that we killed four more bulls, and found ourselves, as night approached, far away from our camp. As, however, we had no desire to spend another night like the previous one, we set forth in search of it. We have heard of looking for a needle in a bundle of hay, and ours seemed a very similar undertaking; still both Stalker and Swiftfoot a.s.serted that they could guide us to the camp by the stars; so on we travelled hour after hour, till they called a halt, and owned that we ought to be there, but that they were at fault as to the exact spot. Some thought that it was farther on, some to the right, and some to the left. The only point in which we were all agreed was that we were not at it, and that we must make up our minds to spend as disagreeable a night as the last.

There was a crescent moon, but that was about to set; by its faint light we discovered a small copse not far off. On the leeside of it we lighted our fire, round which we tramped for the remainder of the night, the trees not allowing us sufficient shelter to enable us to lie down without a great risk of being frozen to death. It was a weary and uninteresting employment after a hard day's work, and while I went round and round the fire I began to consider whether I might not have been more pleasantly occupied in shooting pheasants and partridges at home, with a good night's rest in a comfortable bed at the end of each day.

"Begone such lazy thoughts," I, however, exclaimed; "I left home in search of adventures, and I am finding them."

When daylight came, it was, I confess, rather provoking to find that the camp was only three or four hundred yards off, where we had our supply of blankets and other creature comforts. As we had now our sleighs loaded to the utmost, and three buffaloes besides _en cache_, or hidden, that is from the wolves, we turned our faces homewards. The ground was hilly, and as the sun had still considerable power the surface of the snow had been melted, and when frozen again was exceedingly slippery.

The consequence of this was that, one of the horses slipping on the side of a hill, the sleigh broke away and rolled over and over to the bottom.

We ran down, expecting to see the horse killed or seriously injured, and the sleigh broken to pieces, but neither was the worse for the occurrence, and the horse being set on his legs, trotted on as bravely as before. We were not sorry to get back to our winter quarters, which appeared absolutely luxurious after the nights we had spent out in the snow without shelter. How we did sleep, and how we did eat! Hunter's fare, indeed, is not to be despised. We had for breakfast fried fish, buffalo tongues, tea, sugar, dampers, and _galettes_--cakes of simple water and flour, baked under the ashes, and which are very light and nice. For dinner we had, say a dish of boiled buffalo hump, a smoked and boiled buffalo calf whole, a mouffle or dry moose nose, fish, browned in buffalo marrow, loons or other wild ducks, and goose, potatoes, turnips, and abundance of bread.

We had no necessity to dry the meat we had brought, as it would keep frozen through the winter. Near the forts the flesh of the buffaloes killed in winter is preserved through the summer in the following way:-- An ice-pit is made, capable of containing the carca.s.ses of six or seven hundred buffaloes. Ice, from a neighbouring river, is cut into square blocks of a uniform size with saws, like the blocks sent over to England from Wenham Lake. With these the floor and sides of the pit are lined, and cemented together with water thrown on them, which freezes hard.

Each carca.s.s, without being skinned, is divided into four quarters, and they are piled in layers in the pit till it is filled up. It is then covered with a thick coating of straw, which is again protected from the sun and rain by a shed. In this way the meat is kept perfectly good through the summer, and is more tender and of better flavour than when fresh.

We entered into friendly relations with a tribe of Indians, who had taken up their winter quarters in a wood five or six miles off, and from them we learned many devices for catching game, which our own people were not accustomed to practise. We had won their hearts by supplying them with meat, and as they discovered that we could kill buffalo with our rifles with more certainty than they could with their old firearms, or bows and arrows, they were anxious to get us to accompany them in any hunting expedition, knowing that their share of game would be larger than any amount they could catch alone.

The three chief men were called by us, Eagle-eye, Quick-ear, and Wide-awake. Eagle-eye came to us one day to say that some buffalo had been seen very near the station, and invited us to go out and shoot them. The Indians undertook to shoot too, if we would go to a distance and kill the rest as they ran off. Our party was quickly ready, and off we set--the Indians carrying some skins, the object of which we did not understand. After walking eight or ten miles, Eagle-eye called a halt.

Quick-ear produced the skin of a buffalo calf, and Wide-awake that of a wolf, into which they respectively got; while Eagle-eye, telling us to imitate him, led away to the right.

"There, you see, we make one big snake," he observed, as we prepared to follow his footsteps. "The buffalo see us long way off; think we snake among gra.s.s."

What the buffalo thought I do not know, but certainly they took no notice of us--indeed we were a long way off, and perhaps they were engaged in watching the proceedings of Quick-ear, who was representing the antics of an innocent little buffalo calf. Nearer and nearer the little calf they drew; now they stopped, rather doubtful; then they advanced a little and stopped again. Suddenly a wolf, represented by Wide-awake, appeared on the scene, and the calf bellowed piteously; the wolf sprang savagely on him; the kind-hearted buffaloes could stand it no longer, but rushed forward to rescue their young fellow-creature, when Quick-ear and Wide-awake, jumping up with their rifles, which had been lying by their sides, in their hands, let fly, and brought down two of them. The rest scampered off towards where we were posted, nor did they appear to notice us till four more of their number had fallen, when the survivors turned, and were soon out of reach of our rifles.

The Indians, on seeing the success of their stratagem, sprang forward, shouting and leaping with joy, and soon had the animals cut up and ready for transportation to their lodges and our huts. Our horse-sleighs soon after appeared, followed by theirs, dragged by dogs, and guided by their squaws. Before moving, a feast was held by our Red friends; the men eating first, and enjoying the t.i.t bits, then the hard-worked women were fed, and lastly the dogs came in for their share. When the variety of ways employed to kill buffalo is remembered, it will not appear surprising that their numbers are rapidly decreasing.