16 THE LABRADOR PENINSULA. chap. xxi. 



other large animal, in the belief that if such were dis- 

 covered they would soon kill one of the animals whose 

 bones were figured in it. They rejected the marrow in 

 the vertebne of the spine of every animal, beheving that, 

 if they were to eat it, they would thenceforward be 

 subject to pains in the back. 



Paul le Jeune relates that hi liis time, in 1633, tlie 

 Montagnais paid the utmost respect to their conjurors, 

 and were greatly afraid of them. Often would the con- 

 juror assemble the whole camp at midnight or at two 

 aiid three in the morning, during a piercing cold, the 

 women bringing their httle children through the deep 

 snows to the conjuror's or a neighbour's lodge ; yet none 

 ever complained of being summoned from their lodges 

 at untimely hours, or in bad weather, or for useless 

 purposes, but all patiently waited through the long cold 

 night to hear the prophetic visions of the impostor. 



The power of the conjuror has often induced the 

 Crees to commit outrages against the whites, in some 

 instances attended with terrible bloodshed and murder. 

 So late as tlie year 1831, the Indians of Eupert's Eiver and 

 James's Bay — Mustegans,* as they are termed — inspired 

 by the promises of their conjuror, attacked a post of the 

 Hudson's Bay Company, and killed the officer in charge, 

 his family, and some employes, in all twelve persons ; 

 they next determined to attack Eupert's house, and then 

 Moose factory, but happily some of the people attached 

 to the post first attacked escaped and found their way 



* Mustegans, allied to the Swampys. They are Crees, and those of the 

 Avest side of the Labrador Peninsula are, in many respects, like the Xas- 

 quapees. 



