146 THE STORY OF THE TRAPPER 



coining over the face as well as the neck &quot; to keep de 

 sun off/ he would mumble out if you asked him why. 

 More than that of the mysterious frill worn on dark 

 days as well as sunny, he would never vouch unless 

 some town-bred man patronizingly pooh-poohed the 

 dangers of bear-hunting. Then the grass strands 

 would tremble with excitement and the little French 

 hunter s body would quiver and he would begin pour 

 ing forth a jumble, half habitant half Indian with a 

 mixture of all the oaths from both languages, pointing 

 and pointing at his hidden face and bidding you look 

 what the bear had done to him, but never lifting the 

 thick frill. 



It was somewhere between the tributary waters 

 that flow north to the Saskatchewan and the rivers 

 that start near the Saskatchewan to flow south to the 

 Missouri. Ba tiste and the three trappers who were 

 with him did not know which side of the boundary 

 they were on. By slow travel, stopping one day to 

 trap beaver, pausing on the way to forage for meat, 

 building their canoes where they needed them and 

 abandoning the boats when they made a long overland 

 portage, they were three weeks north of the American 

 fur post on the banks of the Missouri. The hunters 

 were travelling light-handed. That is, they were car 

 rying only a little salt and tea and tobacco. For the 

 rest, they were depending on their muskets. Game 

 had not been plentiful. 



Between the prairie and &quot;the Mountains of the 

 Setting Sun &quot; as the Indians call the Eockies a 

 long line of tortuous, snaky red crawled sinuously over 

 the crests of the foothills; and all game bird and 



