NORTHERN OCEAN 113 



evening, Matonabbee was taken very ill ; and from the nature 1770. 

 of his complaint, I judged his illness to have proceeded from ^^^^ ^'* 

 the enormous quantity of meat that he had eat on the twenty- 

 seventh, as he had been indisposed ever since that time. 

 Nothing is more common with those Indians, after they have 

 eat as much at a sitting as would serve six moderate men, 

 than to find themselves out of order ; but not one of them 

 can bear to hear that it is the effect of eating too much : in 

 defence of which they say, that the meanest of the animal 

 creation knows when hunger is satisfied, and will leave off 

 accordingly. This, however, is a false assertion, advanced 

 knowingly in support of an absurd argument ; for it is well 

 known by them, as well as all the Southern Indians, that the 

 black bear, who, for size and the delicacy of its flesh, may justly 

 be called a respectable animal, is so far from knowing [70] 

 when its hunger is satisfied, that, in the Summer, when the 

 berries are ripe, it will gorge to such a degree, that it fre- 

 quently, and even daily, vomits up great quantities of new- 

 swallowed fruit, before it has undergone any change in the 

 stomach, and immediately renews its repast with as much 

 eagerness as before. 



Notwithstanding the Northern Indians are at times so 

 voracious, yet they bear hunger with a degree of fortitude 

 which, as Mr. Ellis justly observes of the Southern Indians, 

 "is much easier to admire than to imitate." I have more 

 than once seen the Northern Indians, at the end of three or 

 four days fasting, as merry and jocose on the subject, as if 

 they had voluntarily imposed it on themselves ; and would 

 ask each other in the plainest terms, and in the merriest mood, 

 If they had any inclination for an intrigue with a strange 



Lake. There is no record of any one having visited Island Lake since Hearne's 

 time, but in 1894, while on the way to the Kazan River, I explored two of the 

 upper branches of the Thlewiaza River, which flows into the lake, and was told 

 by the Indians that the distance north-eastward down the river to this lake 

 was not very great. This information, if correct, would place the lake rather 

 farther south than it is placed by Hearne.] 



H 



