56 JOURNAL OP THE TRINIDAD 



I must in the first place ask you to disabuse your minds of 

 any such idea as that I am going to read a learned paper on 

 Natural History in any sense or branch. I am going to do 

 nothing of the sort. I am merely going to give you a few per- 

 sonal reminiscences and recollections of very happy days, spent 

 chiefly in the company of the " x'ed man," the North American 

 Indian, in the remote backwoods of that part of Canada, which 

 formerly, and in my day, constituted the separate Colony of 

 New Brunswick and now forms one of the United Provinces of 

 Canada. I may shortly state how I came to be "gadding 

 about " in these backwoods. 



I went out there in 18 better leave it blank, for I am 



beginning to be no chicken — as Private Secretary to the Hon. 

 Arthur Gordon, now Lord Stanmore, then Governor of that 

 Colony, afterwards one of Trinidad's most able and distinguished 

 Governors, and a Governor, I may remark, who did more perhaps 

 than any other, towards opening up the magnificent resources of 

 this most fertile Island. 



Besides accompanying the Governor in the exploring expedi- 

 tions into the remote parts of his Government which he always 

 undertook during the summer months, and besides spending some 

 three or four months one season in visiting, as Commissioner on 

 Salmon Fisheries, every river in the Province from its source to its 

 mouth, I used every winter to get a few weeks' leave, in order to 

 go out " cariboo hunting and trapping." 



In summer our expeditions beyond civilization were almost 

 always performed in canoes — generally in the fragile, but most 

 serviceable birch-bark canoes of the Indians. Sometimes, but much 

 more rarely, in the "dug-outs" used chiefly by lumbermen. 



These birch-bark canoes are perfect marvels of lightness, of 

 capacity, and buoyancy, and in a certain way — though so fragile — 

 of strength. They are usually " worked " by either one or two 

 men, with light single bladed paddles in deep and smooth water 

 and with the current, and with long poles in shallow water, 

 rapids, and especially against a rapid current. 



If one man only is " working" the canoe, he kneels or stands in 

 the stern and places his passengers or freight sufficiently far 

 forward to trim the canoe. If two men are paddling or poleing 

 they take their places at the bow and stern, passengers and 

 freight in the middle. 



I do not know a more beautiful sight than to see two men, 

 whether Indians or white men, who know how to do it, pole a 

 birch-bark up or down a difficult rapid. You have no doubt 

 many of you, often admired the precision and " time " of a man-of- 

 war's boat, or of a good racing crew. Well it is nothing to the 

 precision, time, and nicety of touch required under such difficulty 



