THE MONTAGNAIS INDIANS 



under the ministration of Pere Arnaud." 

 This was in July, 1861. In 1889 the Hudson's 

 Bay Company, in order to make the place as 

 attractive as possible for the Indians, and as 

 an inducement to bring their furs to this Post, 

 built a small wooden house for the Indians and 

 another three years later. These proved so 

 attractive that the rest of the village was put 

 up, we were told, in the years 1901 to 1903. 

 However successful these houses may have 

 been in stimulating trade, the effect on the 

 health of the Indians has proved far otherwise. 

 Infectious diseases, such as influenza and 

 tuberculosis, were unknown among the primi- 

 tive Indians, who have therefore developed no 

 immunity, but, on the contrary, are especially 

 susceptible to them and quickly succumb. 

 When infected from the whites, they retire, 

 like all ignorant people under the same cir- 

 cumstances, to their houses, and crowd to- 

 gether in close overheated rooms with doors and 

 windows shut. The houses become therefore 

 hotbeds of infection, and the course of the 

 disease is hastened to a fatal termination. 



Hind, writing of his visit in 1861, records 

 the fact that the Indians who lingered on the 



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