JENKS] FOOD OF EARLY WHITES 1101 
the country and seek such subsistence as accident may offer them.”! 
Of the Bad River Indians (Ojibwa of Wisconsin) in 1880, we read: 
“The rice crop will be a failure, and the Indians depend upon this for 
winter use and also for means of obtaining such articles as they need 
and are not furnished by the Department.” ” 
Comment is unnecessary in the face of such testimony. All shows 
that the fcilure of the crop was so infrequent that the Ojibwa Indians 
depended upon wild rice for their winter subsistence, and that its loss 
could not be made up by any other resource of natural production. 
DEPENDENCE OF THE WuitE Man on Wixp Ricr 
Carver wrote, in 1766, in regard to the use of wild rice by the whites: 
Tn future periods it will be of great fervice to the infant colonies, as it will afford 
them a prefent fupport, until in the courfe of cultivation other fupplies may be 
produced.* 
Again, in 1828, Timothy Flint said: 
It is astonishing, amidst all our eager and multiplied agricultural researches, that 
so little attention has been bestowed upon this interesting and valuable grain. It 
has scarcely been known, except by Canadian hunters and savages, that such a grain, 
the resource of a vast extent of country, existed. It surely ought to be ascertained, 
if the drowned lands of the Atlantic country, and the immense marshes and stagnant 
lakes of the south, will grow it. It is a mistake, that it is found only in the northern 
regions of the valley. It grows in perfection on the lakes about Natchitoches, south 
of 82°; and might, probably, be cultivated in all climates of the valley. Though a 
hardy plant, it is subject to some of the accidents, that cause failure of the other 
grains.* 
White men have used this grain chiefly in and near the wild-rice 
district, yet ‘in some parts of the Bay [Quinto bay, Ontario, Canada] 
there grew wild rice, which was much prized by the Indians, and which 
was often used by the settlers... . The grain was much smaller 
than the imported article; not unfrequently, the Indians would collect 
the grain and sell it to the settlers.”° 
Alexander Henry said that on July 20, 1775, at Lake Sagunaec or 
Saginaga, 60 leagues from Grand Portage, he bought fish and wild rice 
** which latter they [the Indians] had in great abundance.” ° July 30, he 
recorded at ** Lake des Iles,” or Lake of the Woods, that fish appeared 
to be their summer food. He found there a village of 100 people, 
by whom 20 bags of wild rice were given him, and he obtained there 
a total of 100 bags of nearly one bushel each. He says that without 
a large quantity of rice the voyage beyond the Saskatchewan river 
could not have been prosecuted to its completion.’ Again, August 1, 


1Indian Affairs Report, 1870, p. 309. 8Carver, Travels, pp. 522-524. 
2Tbid.. 1880, p. 175. 4Flint, Geography and History, vol. 1, p. 85. 
5Carniff, History of the Settlements of Upper Canada (Ontario), with special reference to the Bay 
Quinte, Toronto, 1869, pp. 587-588. 
6Henry, Travels, p. 241. 7Tbid., pp. 243, 244. 
19 ETH, PT 2—O1 35 

