64 



A General History of the Fur Trade. 



and some of them have, since that time, repaired thither, 

 notwithstanding they could have provided themselves with 

 all the necessaries which they required. The difference of 

 the price set on goods here and at that factory, made it an 

 object with the Chepewyans to undertake a journey of five 

 or six months, in the course of which they were reduced to 

 the most painful extremities, and often lost their lives from 

 hunger and fatigue. At present, however, this traffic is in 

 a great measure discontinued, as they were obliged to ex- 

 pend in the course of their journey, that very ammunition 

 which was its most alluring object. 



Some Account of the Knisteneaux Indians. 



A hese people are spread over a vast extent of country. 

 f Their language is the same as that of the people who inha- 

 bit the coast of British America on the Atlantic, with the 

 exception of the Esquimaux,* and continues along the 

 coast of Labrador, and the gulph and banks of St. Laurence 

 to Montreal. The line then follows the Utawas river to its 

 source ; and continues from thence nearly West along the 

 high lands which divide the waters that fall into Lake Su- 

 perior and Hudson's Bay. It then proceeds till it strikes 

 the middle part of the river Winipic, following that water 

 through the Lake Winipic, to the discharge of the Saskatchi- 

 wine into it ; from thence it accompanies the latter to Fort 

 George, when the line, striking by the head of the Beaver 

 River to the Elk River, runs along its banks to its discharge 

 in the Lake of the Hills ; from which it may be carried 

 back East, to the Isle a la Crosse, and so on to Churchill by 

 the Missinipi. The whole of the tract between this line 

 and Hudson's Bay and Straits, (except that of the Esqui- 

 maux in the latter) may be said to be exclusively the coun- 

 try of the Knisteneaux. Some of them, indeed, have pe- 

 netrated further West and South to the Red River, to the 

 South of Lake Winipic, and the South branch of the Sas- 

 katchiwine. 



* The similarity between their language, and that of the Algonquiws, is 

 an unequivocal proof that they are the same people. Specimens of their 

 respective tongues will be hereafter given. 



