CHAPTER X. 



INLAND PACKS. 



Prior to 1865, furs at inland posts were made 

 up in packs of ninety pounds for transport to 

 the frontier, but some of the young canoe men 

 were not sufficiently strong to handle such a 

 weight in debarking or loading them into the 

 canoes, and a pack slipping from their grasp 

 into the water and becoming wet inside caused 

 delay to the whole brigade. A stop had to be 

 made and the damaged pack unlaced, dried and 

 repaired, before the journey could be resumed. 



About the year mentioned, a top pack slipped 

 off a man's back while being carried over a side 

 portage, and before the man could save it had 

 bounded down the hillside into the rapid, and 

 was lost. 



This happened to be a very valuable pack- 

 age, and its loss being reported called forth the 

 next year, from headquarters, a general order 

 to reduce the weight from ninety to eighty 

 pounds per pack, and to make each package of 

 pure skins i. e., skins of only one kind. 



This order to discontinue the mixing of skins 

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