54 CANADIAN WILDS. 



Each officer of the posts had the welfare of 

 the Indians as much at heart as a father has 

 for his own children. In sickness they attended 

 them, in trading they advised them what goods 

 would be most beneficial and lasting to their 

 requirements and as far as they could in a pa- 

 cific way they advised them when trouble arose 

 between any members of the tribe. 



In those days when the Company had the 

 country under their exclusive sway, no cheap, 

 shoddy goods were imported in the trading 

 forts Durability was looked for, not flashy fin- 

 ery. These came with the opening of the coun- 

 try and the advent of peddlers and unprinci- 

 palled traders. We see the results of this today 

 at any of the stations where our transconti- 

 nental train stops. Bands of the once well-con- 

 ditioned, well-clothed, sober Indians are now re- 

 placed by ragged, emaciated, vice marked de- 

 scendants of these, hanging around in idleness, 

 an object lesson of what so-called civilization 

 has brought them to. Except in some far back 

 isolated posts, the Indian's word goes for noth- 

 ing. They have lost the once binding obligation 

 that their promise carried and the trader can 

 no longer depend on them. 



As the writer knew the pagan and uncivi- 

 lized Indian some forty years ago he was truth- 

 ful, sober, honest and moral. I won't say the 



