A General History of the Fur Trade. 



11 



To aggravate the picture, if aggravation were possible, 

 may be added, the putrid carcases which the wolves, with a 

 furious voracity, dragged forth from the huts, or which 

 were mangled within them by the dogs, whose hunger was 

 satisfied with the disfigured remains of their masters. Nor 

 was it uncommon for the father of a family, whom the in- 

 fection had not reached, to call them around him, to repre- 

 sent the cruel sufferings and horrid fate of their relations, 

 from the influence of some evil spirit who was preparing to 

 extirpate their race ; and to incite them to bafRe death, with 

 all its horrors, by their own poniards. At the same time, 

 if their hearts failed them in this necessary act, he was him- 

 self ready to perform the deed of mercy with his own hand, 

 as the last act of his affection, and instantly to follow them 

 to the commonplace of rest and refuge from human evil. 



It was never satisfactorily ascertained by what means this 

 malignant disorder was introduced, but it was generally 

 supposed to be from the Missisouri, by a war party. 



The consequence of this melancholy event to the traders 

 must be self-evident ; the means of disposing of their goods 

 were cut off ; and no furs were obtained, but such as had 

 been gathered from the habitations of the deceased Indians, 

 which could not be very considerable: nor did they look, 

 from the losses of the present year, with any encouraging 

 expectations to those which were to come. The only for- 

 tunate people consisted of a party who had again penetrated 

 to the Northward and Westward in 1780, at some distance 

 up the Missinipi, or English River, to Lake la Rouge. Two 

 unfortunate circumstances, however, happened to them ; 

 which are as follow : 



Mr. Wadin, a Swiss gentleman, of strict probity and 

 known sobriety, had gone there in the year 1779, and re- 

 mained during the summer 1780. His partners and others, 

 engaged in an opposite interest, when at the Grande Portage, 

 agreed to send a quantity of goods on their joint account, 

 which was accepted, and Mr. Pond was proposed by them 

 to be their representative to act in conjunction with Mr. 

 Wadin. Two men, of more opposite characters, could 

 not, perhaps, have been found. In short, from various 

 causes, their situations became very uncomfortable to each 

 other, and mutual ill will was the natural consequence : with- 

 out entering, therefore, into a minute history of these trans- 

 actions, it will be sufficient to observe, that, about the end 

 of the year 1780, or the beginning of the year 1781, Mr. 



