32 ACROSS THE SUB-ARCTICS OF CANADA. 
take, these matters were arranged with Schott, and all 
but our instruments, tents, blankets and three or four 
days’ provisions were handed over to him. 
On the evening of the 4th, the steamer Athabasca 
also put in an appearance, and made fast to the shore a 
little above the scows. Grand Rapid was no longer an 
uninhabited wilderness, but had now become trans- 
formed into a scene of strange wild life. Large dark, 
savage-looking figures, 
many of them bare to the 
waist, and adorned with 
head-dresses of fox-tails or 
feathers, were everywhere 
to be seen. Some of them, 
notably those of the Chip- 
pewyan tribe, were the 
blackest and most savage- 
looking Indians I had ever 
seen. As it was already 
nearly night when the last 
of them arrived by the 
steamer, the work of tran- 
shipping was left for the 
morning. In the dark woods the light of camp-fires 
began soon to appear, and around them the whole night 
long the Indians danced and gambled, at the same time 
keeping up their execrable drum musie. 
At daylight the next morning the overhauling of 
cargoes was commenced. One by one the scows were 
loosened and piloted down the middle of the rapid to 
the wharf at the head of the island. Here they were 
unloaded, and after being lightened, were lowered down 
ENGLISH-CHIPPEWYAN HALF- 
BREED. 
