A LABRADOR SPRING 
the annual migration of the Montagnais Indians 
is not the least so. 
According to the annual report of the De- 
partment of Indian Affairs published in Ottawa 
in 1908, the number of Montagnais Indians for 
this strip of southern Labrador coast is 694; 
of these 76 come to the shore at Natashquan, 
241 at Mingan and 377 at Seven Islands. The 
numbers given by Hind for 1857 were 100, 500 
and 300 respectively. With the exception of 
a very few who are too old or feeble to travel, 
all of these Indians spend the greater part of 
the year in the interior, making their annual 
migration to the coast in May or early in June 
when the ice goes out of the rivers, and re- 
turning in August. Those whose brief summer 
residence is at Seven Islands generally reach 
the interior by the St. Marguerite or by the 
Moisie River, while the Mingan contingent 
ascend the St. John River, and, by a series of 
smaller streams and lakes and many portages, 
cross to the Romaine, up which they travel into 
the interior. The Indians coming to the mouth 
of the Natashquan use that great river as a 
highway into the interior. 
The early return of the Indians to the wilds 
166 
