THE INDIANS 185 
distinct a division of language that existing tribes cannot 
converse in Indian; and as observed by the writer upon 
the meeting of a Montagnais with an Abnaki acquaintance 
on the winter trail, conversation must proceed in some 
foreign language — in this instancein French. The Indians 
of the Labrador estimate that as many as half of the people 
speak no language but their own. The presence of white 
blood is largely evident in the southwest, adjacent to the 
settlements and the upper gulf; and many who are counted 
Indians might, but for the saving effect of a hunting life 
inland, be reckoned as white rather than red. 
Low writes : — 
“The most northern tribe has a tradition that their 
people originally lived far to the south, and it is prob- 
able that they were driven northward from the country 
about the St. Lawrence by the Iroquois, about the time 
of the first settlement of Canada, by the French. There 
are many traditions about these wars among the northern 
Indians, and it is surprising to what distances the Iroquois 
followed them, into the middle of Labrador, and up the east 
coast of Hudson Bay to the neighbourhood of the mouth 
of the Big River in north lat. 54°. As the Crees retreated 
before the Iroquois, they in turn displaced the Eskimo, 
who at one time occupied the eastern and southern portions 
of the peninsula as far as Eskimo Bay on the Gulf of St. 
Lawrence and all the territory about Hudson Bay. These 
wars terminated when the Eskimo became supplied with 
firearms, and are now traditions of the distant past; but 
the memories still live, and the Eskimo and Indians, al- 
though never engaging in open hostilities, have a mutual 
hatred and never intermarry. The northern Indians 
still regard with fear the descendants of the once fierce 
Iroquois, and their name is used to frighten children.” 
