THE INDIANS 187 
meet as may happen during the hunting season, and ex- 
change their unwritten news; slight, indeed, is the occur- 
rence, from side to side of the country, which escapes those 
lodge-fire gatherings. Families hidden here and there 
in remote valleys may wait for their news, perforce, until 
late in the spring, when at various rendezvous they group 
together for the down-river voyages; or even until the sum- 
mer meeting on the reserve, where all subjects have their 
final review; but on the far lake levels of the high interior, 
the hunting-place of the strong and skilful, their network 
of communication is seldom long broken. There, about 
the central area, gather the rivers which flow to the four 
coasts, and there the people converge. In the words of 
John Bastian of Pointe Bleue, “At Kaniapishkau you 
meet Indians from all shores.”’ 
Almost all the Montagnais families leave their hunting- 
grounds when the fur becomes poor —technically, “com- 
mon ’’ —in the spring. About the last of the fur-hunting 
comes with the bear-hunt, late in May, when the snow has 
settled down and the bears begin to move about after their 
winter’s sleep. By the last of June the people are gathered 
upon the reserves along the Gulf and on the Saguenay. 
Sometimes a family remains inland two years for some rea- 
son, most often because of a light catch of fur. In suchan 
event some neighbour usually takes down what skins there 
may be,and brings up purchases accordingly in the fall. 
There is not much trouble about subsistence in the summer 
for those who stay in. Fish, taken almost wholly by net 
and spear, are nearly unfailing, and there are some ducks, 
geese, and small animals, besides eggs and berries; enough 
all told to get along on, although the large game fail. 
