330 



HUDSON'S BAY. 



Hudson's hairs by the root, though they seldom effect this very 

 ^?* y '__, completely. They have no hair under their arm pits, 

 ""~f or on any oilier part of the body, except in those places 

 which nature directs them to conceal. The skins of 

 the women are soft, smooth, and polished ; and, when 

 they are dressed in clean clothing, they are entirely free 

 from any offensive smell. All the tribes of the North- 

 ern Indians have three or four parallel black strokes on 

 each cheek, which are produced by introducing an awl 

 * or needle under the skin, and rubbing powdered char- 

 coal into the wound after the instrument is drawn out. 

 As almost the whole of their country is little better than 

 a mass of rocks and stones, scarcely producing any other 

 vegetable food than moss for the deer, they have few 

 opportunities of collecting furs ; and subsist chiefly by 

 hunting and fishing. A few of the more active or rest- 

 less among them, who have acquired a taste for Euro- 

 pean articles, collect the furs from the rest, or from the 

 Dog-ribbed and Copper Indians, or from their own 

 hunting excursions towards the inland districts, where 

 the proper animals abound ; and, after carrying these 

 to the factories with great risks and fatigues, barter, en 

 their return, the fruits of their traffic with then- less am- 

 bitious countrymen for necessary food and clothing. 

 But the greater part, though they may have visited the 

 factories once in their lives, lead a happier life, and en- 

 joy a more comfortable subsistence in their own coun- 

 try. Their real wants are easily supplied ; and a hatch- 

 et, ice-chisel, file, and knife, are almost all that is requi- 

 site to enable them, with a little industry, to procure a 

 plentiful supply of food and clothing. They subsist 

 chiefly on venison, and generally spend the whole sum- 

 mer in hunting the deer on the open plains, or catching 

 Hunting ^ s ^ m *' le r ' vers ar >d lakes. As they have no dogs 

 trained to the chace like the Southern Indians, and as 

 they seldom have powder and ball in sufficient abun- 

 dance for the purpose, they make use of their bows and 

 arrows in killing the deer, as they pass through the 

 narrow defiles, into which they drive the herds in the 

 following manner. Upon seeing the deer, they betake 

 themselves to leeward, lest they should be smelled by 

 the animals; and then search for a convenient place 

 for concealing the marksmen. They next collect a num- 

 ber of sticks, like large ramrods, with a small flag at 

 the top of each, and these they fix upright in the ground 

 abore fifteen or twenty yards from each other, so as to 

 form two sides of a very acute angle, terminating in 

 the defile, where the huntsmen are concealed behind 

 loose stones, heaps of moss, &c. The women and boys 

 then divide into two parties, and going round on both 

 sides, till they form a crescent behind the herd, drive 

 them straight forward between the rows of sticks into 

 the place of concealment, where they are shot as they 

 run along. The same mode is employed in the winter 

 season, to drive the deer into a pound or inclosed space 

 fenced round with brushy trees. These pounds are of 

 various sizes according to circumstances, and are some- 

 times about a mile in circumference. The door or en- 

 trance is not wider than a common gate, and the inside 

 of the space inclosed is so crossed with hedges as to 

 form a kind of labyrinth, at every opening of which 

 also are placed snares made of thongs. As soon as the 

 deer are driven into the pound, the gateway is blocked 

 up with trees and brushwood, prepared for the purpose ; 

 and, while the women and children walk round the out- 

 side of the fence, to prevent the imprisoned animals 

 from breaking through or leaping over, the men are em- 

 ployed in shooting those which run loose, or in spear- 

 ing those which have been entangled in the snares. 



4. 



About the end of March or beginning of April, when 

 the snow, slightly thawed during the day, is frozen du- 

 ring the night into a thin crust, which easily bears the 

 Indian on his snow shoes, but sinks under the hoof of 

 the deer, it is a common practice to kill the moose deer, 

 by literally running them down. The hunters, lightly 

 clothed, and armed only with a bow and arrows, a 

 knife, or broad bayonet, generally tire the deer in less 

 than a day, though sometimes they continue the chace 

 for two days before they can come up with the game. 

 These animals, however, when incapable of running 

 farther, make a very desperate defence with their head 

 and forefeet, and unless the Indians are provided with 

 a short gun, or with bows and arrows, they find it ne- 

 cessary to fasten their knives or bayonets to the end of 

 a long pole, in order to stab the deer, without coming 

 within reach of their feet. The flesh of the animals 

 killed in this manner is so overheated by the long run, 

 that it is never well tasted. In taking fish, they make 

 use of nets and hooks at all seasons of the year. Their 

 fishing nets are made of thongs cut from raw-deer skins, 

 (much inferior to those of the Dog-ribbed Indians, 

 which are made of the inner bark of the willow tree) 

 and are furnished with various appendages, such as 

 the bills and feet of birds, toes and jaws of otters, &c. 

 which they superstitiously consider as essential to their 

 success. These nets are always used separately, and 

 placed at a distance from each other ; and on no ac- 

 count would they unite them together for the purpose 

 of stretching across the channel of a narrow river ; be- 

 cause they imagine that one net would become jealous 

 of its neighbour, and would not catch a single fish. In 

 fishing with hooks they are equally influenced by su- 

 perstitious notions ; and all the baits which they use 

 are compositions of charms, inclosed within a piece of 

 fish-skin, so as to resemble a small fish. These charms 

 are bits of beavers' tails, otters' teeth, musk-rats' en- 

 trails, squirrels' testicles, curdled milk taken from the 

 stomachs of sucking fawns and calves, human hair, 

 &c. ; and almost every lake and river is supposed to 

 require a peculiar combination of different articles. A 

 net or hook, that has taken many fish, is valued accord- 

 ingly ; and would be taken as an equivalent for a num- 

 ber of new ones, which had never been tried, or which 

 had not proved successful. In winter the hooks are let 

 down through round holes cut in the ice, and are kept 

 in constant motion, both to allure the fish, and to pre- 

 vent the freezing of the water. From want of fuel, p 00( , 

 they are frequently obliged to eat their victuals in a 

 raw state ; and this they occasionally do from choice, 

 especially in the case of fish, which they seldom dress 

 so far, (even where fire is at hand) as to warm it tho- 

 roughly. A few of them purchase brass kettles from 

 the European factories; but the greater part still pre- 

 pare their food in large upright vessels made of birch 

 bark. As these vessels will not admit of being exposed 

 to the fire, the water is made to boil by a succession of 

 hot stones being introduced ; a method which effects 

 the purpose very expeditiously, but mixes much sand 

 with the victuals, in consequence of the stones fre- 

 quently mouldering down in the kettle. They employ 

 also the ordinary methods of broiling their food, or 

 roasting it by a string. They make a favourite dish, by 

 boiling in a deer's paunch or stomach a mixture of 

 minced meat, blood, and fat ; but the fat is chewed by 

 the men and boys, to prepare it for mixing more inti- 

 mately with the other ingredients, and the half-digested 

 food, found in the animal's stomach, is carefully added 

 to the mess. In winter, when the deer feed upon a 



