ROMANCE AND ADVENTURE 5 



pany's flag fluttered over Fort Consolation. Plainly, the 

 arrival of our canoe was causing excitement at the Post. 

 Trader Spear laughed aloud: 



"That's one on old Mackenzie. He's taking my canoe for 

 that of the Hudson's Bay Inspector. He's generally due about 

 this time." 



From all directions men, women, and children were swarming 

 toward the landing, and when our canoe arrived there must 

 have been fully four hundred Indians present. The first to 

 greet us was Factor Mackenzie a gruff, bearded Scotsman 

 with a clean-shaven upper lip, gray hair, and piercing gray 

 eyes. When we entered the Factor's house we found it to be a 

 typical wilderness home of an officer of the Hudson's Bay 

 Company; and, therefore, as far unlike the interiors of fur- 

 traders' houses as shown upon the stage, movie screen, or in 

 magazine illustration, as it is possible to imagine. Upon the 

 walls we saw neither mounted heads nor skins of wild animals; 

 nor were fur robes spread upon the floors, as one would expect 

 to find after reading the average story of Hudson's Bay life. 

 On the contrary, the well-scrubbed floors were perfectly bare, 

 and the walls were papered from top to bottom with countless 

 illustrations cut from the London Graphic and the Illustrated 

 London News. The pictures not only took the place of wall 

 paper, making the house more nearly wind-proof, but also 

 afforded endless amusement to those who had to spend therein 

 the long winter months. The house was furnished sparingly 

 with simple, home-made furniture that had more the appearance 

 of utility than of beauty. 



At supper time we sat down with Mrs. Mackenzie, the 

 Factor's half-breed wife, who took the head of the table. After 

 the meal we gathered in the living room before an open fire, 

 over the mantelpiece of which there were no guns, no powder 

 horns, nor even a pair of snowshoes; for a fur trader would no 

 more think of hanging his snowshoes there than a city dweller 



