1912 AND FISHEKIES COMMISSION. 201 



imprisonment or fine where he barters or attempts to barter any form of 

 game proscribed by the white man's law or during the period when such 

 game is out of the legal season, except and only within the limits of 

 his reservation and there only among his own kind. The principle of 

 allowing Indians to do so in respect to game, fur or fish would not only 

 be a manifest injustice to the general public and an incentive to gen- 

 eral disregard of the laws, but a palpable absurdity into the bargain. 

 At the present time the Indian's chief depredations are undoubtedly 

 due to cupidity born of the knowledge that he can dispose of his spoils 

 to the white man. A few instances of really rigorous punishment 

 applied to both white man and Indian concerned in such a deal would 

 undoubtedly go a long way to check tlie present extent of this evil. A 

 method of dealing with the question of trapping will be discussed in a 

 succeeding section, but in regard to game and fisih it may be observed 

 that the most satisfactory manner of dispoising of this problem, from the 

 point of view, at least, of economy in natural resources, would be to 

 have one law applicable to white man and Indian alike in regard to open 

 seasons and bag limits on public lands, with the privilege to the Indian 

 of securing a permit to take all such game as the law allowed free of 

 charge. Thei-e can be little doubt that the special privileges in regard 

 to big game mentioned in a previous section of this repor-t in regard to 

 the poor settler in wild regions should be amply sufficient to provide for 

 the wants of any Indian family also during the winter months, and in 

 the summer the Indian family, like the family of the settler, should be 

 able to subsiist comfortably on the proceeds of the winter's trapping or 

 other work, on such products of the soil as their energy causes to be 

 produced or which are to be found growing wild in the neighborhood, 

 and on the fish which they are so adept in catching. 



Another point to which attention has to be called in regard to 

 Indians in relation to game is that within or in the immediate vicinity 

 of certain of the provincial forest reserves there are Indian reservations 

 and in one instance, at least, that of the Quetico Forest Reserve, it would 

 appear that the Indians habitually /hunt and trap therein. It is to be 

 observed that if tlie game in a reserve is to be hunted, one of the principal 

 values of such reserve will disappear, and further, that if trapping is to 

 be conducted in a reserve, it w"ould lappear that, as previously noted in 

 this report, the profits should accrue to the public to offset the charges 

 for tlie protection of the reserve. Whether or no it is any more feasible 

 to prevent Indians hunting and trapping in a provincial forest reserve 

 than on any otlier public lands is a question which will have to be 

 decided upon by the proper authorities, but at least it must be apparent 

 that if the provincial reserves are to fulfil their proper functions 

 In regard to game of all descriptions, the greatest efforts sihould be made 

 to keep the hunting Indian out of them, or at least to limit his operations 

 to the removal of such fur-bearing animals as may be deemed advisable 

 by the authorities under the supervision of government officials and for 



