AN INDIAN FAMILY ON THE MONTREAL RIVER 



dians as Spirit Mountain, the happy 

 hunting grounds of the good Indians 

 after death. Here is a Sacred Cave 

 and an oracle whom the Indians con- 

 sult in times of dire need. 



Along the Obisaga narrows we 

 found an abundance of cranberries, a 

 welcome change to our diet of fish and 

 bacon. 



A September morning on Mattawa- 

 bika Lake. We never dreamed that 

 earth held anything half so beautiful. 

 The Lake was one vast mirror reflect- 

 ing sky and shore in the bright sun- 

 shine. It was dreamland. 



Below Mattawabika falls on the 

 Montreal River we came to a clearance 

 and a farm. An old man who was 

 raking hay near the water's edge 

 greeted us cordially when we stopped 

 to buy eggs and vegetables, 



An octogenarian and almost blind, he 

 was a man of magnificent physique 

 and much natural grace of bearing. 

 He had been a Hudson Bay Co. trader 

 for fifty-five years, and told us many 

 interesting stories of Indian life. We 

 had supposed him to be a white man 

 until we saw his daughter, who was 

 a full-blooded squaw, and we learned 

 that he was an Ojibway Indian. 



He told us that this clearance had 

 been famous as a meeting place for the 

 Indians for hundreds of years, and was 

 a noted battleground between the Iro- 

 quois and the Ojibways. We visited 

 the high hill at the back of the house, 

 and saw the trenches from which the 

 Iroquois watched their enemies as they 

 came up or down the river. Numbers 

 of flint arrow-heads are still found here 

 and the place is still a favorite camp- 



36 



