harmon's journal. 



271 



wilderness? The thought has in it the bitterness 

 of death. How could I tear them from a moth- 

 er's love, and leave her to mourn over ther ab- 

 sence, to the day of her death ? Possessing only 

 the common feelings of humanity, how could I 

 think of her, in such circumstances, without an- 

 guish ? On the whole, I consider the course 

 which I design to pursue, as the only one which 

 religion and humanity would justify. 



Mr. M' Dougall informs me, that, not long 

 since, an Indian died at Frazer's Lake, and left 

 behind him a widow, who had been in similar cir- 

 cumstances before, by the loss of a former hus- 

 band. A day or two before the corpse was to be 

 burned, she told the relations of her late husband, 

 that she was resolved not to undergo a second 

 slavery. She therefore left the tent, secretly, in 

 the evening, and hung herself from a tree. , 



Among the Carriers, widows are slaves to the 

 relations of their deceased husbands, for the term 

 of two or three years from the commencement of 

 their widowhood, during which, they are general- 

 ly treated in a cruel manner. Their heads are 

 shaved, and it belongs to them to do all the drudg- 

 ery, about the tent. They are frequently beaten 

 with a club or an axe, or some such weapon. 



Saturday, May 8. M c Leod\s Lake, I arriv- 

 ed here about two months since. Yesterday, the 



