1104 WILD RICE GATHERERS OF UPPER LAKES (ETH. ANN. 19 
The section of country referred to in the following quotation pro- 
duced little, if any, maize, and at the time of the statement the bison 
were driven several days westward, so that about all the consumable 
provisions which the Indians could supply were wild rice and maple 
sugar. Robert Stuart, agent of the American Fur Company, wrote to 
George Boyd, agent for Indian affairs at Michilimackinac, asking 
permission to convey ‘‘only twelve barrels of whiskey” into the 
country where they wished to extend their trade, ** but the difficulties 
they have at present to contend with in extending their trade in a 
direction where they come in immediate contact with the Hudson Bay 
Company along the frontier, from the Grand Portage to the Lake of 
the Woods, the situation of the country, and the means of conveyance, 
completely preclude them from sending in provisions for the support 
of the people who are necessarily employed in transporting their goods, 
and for the prosecution of the trade. The Hudson Bay Company get 
most of their provisions from the Indians for liquor; and as long as 
those people have this in their power, our people must inevitably be 
starved.”? 
Doty says, quoted by Dr Morse in 1822: ** The fish and the wild 
rice are the chief sustenance of the traders, and without them the trade 
could scarcely be carried on.”* Schoolcraft, who gathered his facts 
during this period, says, in speaking of the wild rice, ** Much of it is 
sold to the traders, to subsist their men, on their visits to the Indians.”* 
Again we hear from Leech lake in 1835 concerning Mr William 
T. Boutwell, a missionary: 
His remoteness from the white settlements exposes him to many inconveniences, 
and compels him to depend almost entirely on the fish of the lakes, and the wild rice 
gathered in the marshes and creeks, for subsistence; and these afford but a preca- 
rious supply. As game is every year becoming scarcer, and their rice so frequently 
fails, the Indians will soon be driven to the alternative of cultivating the land or per- 
ishing by famine.* 1 
In the year 1852, Mrs Ellet, a traveler, was given by Mrs Ansell 
Smith, who resided near the Falls of the St Croix river, ‘ta sack made 
by the Chippewas [Ojibwa] of braided strips of bark, in a shape rudely 
resembling a papoose, filled with wild rice which is one of the sta- 
ples of the territory ... They [the Ojibwa] sell large quantities to 
the whites, some preferring it to the common rice of the south.”° It 
is unnecessary to cite more instances, but wild rice has been used hy 
1 Papers of George Boyd, vol. 1, manuscript letter 117 (cirea 1820), in Wisconsin Historical Society's 
manuscript collections. 
2 Morse, Report, appendix, p. 31. 
There were 17 trading posts about the headwaters of the Mississippi river in 1826. Six were of the 
Columbia Fur Company, 9 were of the American Fur Company, 1 was at Fort Green, 1 was a post fac- 
tory near Fort Snelling, on the St Peters (Minnesota) river (from a ‘*Cireular [from] Indian agency 
on St Peters (Upper Mississippi), 2d April, 1826,"’ in Papers of George Boyd, vol. 11, manuscript 90). 
‘Schoolcraft, Indian Tribes, vol. 11, p. 63. 
‘Indian Bulletin for 1868, number 2, p. 102. 
5 Mrs Ellet, Summer Rambles, pp. 151, 152. 
