Path Finding in the Kootenay Country, &c. 3 1 1 



ago, i.e., in families scattered over the whole country. Twice a 

 year these nomadic groups, of which the tribes are composed, 

 assemble at a well-known tribal rendezvous. From two to four 

 weeks of social intercourse and feasting mark these periodical 

 meetings. Affairs affecting the whole tribe are discussed and 

 smoked over, marriages are contracted, and the necessary 

 arrangements for the forthcoming fur hunting campaign are 

 entered upon. Then they disperse, each family in its own 

 direction, not to meet again until the next assembly at the 

 common rendezvous, unless by special appointment between 

 individual families, at some known trysting spot deep in the dark 

 and moisture-laden fastnesses of the forested mountains, where, far 

 away from human associations, in the midst of vast and dense 

 woods, these nomads of the forest will live a life very little superior 

 in its accessories to that of their prey, the industrious beaver or the 

 restless and wily caribou. Untiring application to the chase, an 

 intimate knowledge of every possible resource afforded by the 

 country, and an unwavering self-reliance go hand in hand to 

 enable these nomads to sustain life in these very inhospitable 

 wilds. The many devices they adopt to economise their trifling 

 little stores of essentials, and the habits of providence which the 

 nature of the life they lead necessitates, have in them something 

 pathetic, and none more so than the custom of caching (hiding) 

 articles specially needed against times of dire want. I am not 

 referring here to the large caches of peltry or dried meat or 

 fish carefully done up in pine bark which are made to save 

 transportation when moving camp from a place which on their 

 return journey they must pass, but rather to the small wayside caches 

 of trifles. To make these caches, a dead, but still standing, tree is 

 selected, if possible in a spot which has already been burnt over 

 by forest fires. With his axe the Indian takes out one big chip, 

 which is carefully preserved. He then hollows out a more or less 

 spacious cupboard-like receptacle, wherein he deposits his valuables, 

 perhaps a few charges of powder and ball, a bit of tobacco, a spare 

 flint, a piece or two of old wire, a few fish-hooks, or some other 



