383 
Lesser Slave lake, the “ Slave ” Indians mentioned by Mackenzie, 
were one of their bands, although this is by no means certain. Before 
1760, however, bands of Cree, provided with firearms by the fur 
traders on Hudsoji bay, crossed over into the basin of the Mackenzie, 
drove out or destroyed the “ Slave ” Indians of Lesser Slave lake, 
and, sweeping the Beaver from the valley of the Athabaska, con- 
fined them to the basin of the Peace. The eastern Beaver then 
patched up a truce with the Cree, adoptefl their dress and many 
of their customs, and joined them for a few years in trafling at 
Chi])ewyaii; but they never attempted to regain their lost territories, 
since the fur posts established soon afterwards on the Peace river took 
care of all their needs. The western Beaver, however, moved farther 
up the Peace river, displaced the Sekani from the mouth of the 
Smoky river to Rocky Mountain canyon, and maintained their old 
customs for several decades.^ 
We know very little about tiie early customs of the Beaver, 
except that they did not differ greatly from those of the Sekani. 
Like the latter, the Beaver depended far more on hunting than on 
fishing, and employed snares at every possible ojiportunity. Moose, 
caribou, beaver," and other game abounded, and there were numerous 
buffalo which the Indians drove into pounds after the manner of 
the plains’ tribes. Yet they esteemerl the buffalo less higiily than 
the moose, which gave them not only meat, but skins for clothing 
and for the covers of their tents. These tents were the conical tipi- 
like structures, common throughout the basin of tlie Mackenzie, which 
the Sekani covered with spruce bark, but most of the tribes with 
caribou skins. The Beaver often discarded them during the dry 
summer months, using in their place either temporary stielters of 
brush roughly constructed in the same form, or simple lean-tos. 
For transport the Beaver used toboggans drawn by the women, 
anrl canoes covered with spruce baiL. which were apparently the 
commonest type of canoe among all the Athapaskan tribes iirevious 
to their contact with the Cree.'^ Their cooking vessels, also, were 
1 Mackf'nzit': Op. cif,. ])|i. 123, 126, 13D f. 116. Mackonzif callfi tlir- ui-sfeni RfavcT, wlio siihsc- 
ouently cenlri'd around Forts Dunvojfan and St, Jolin, Rofky Mountain Indians, llip soino iiamo that 
he apidics to tlie .Sokani. Tlie Indians who liave their centre to-day at Hudson IIoi>e are of mixed 
Beaver-Sekiini parentage, save for ,soine Cree. who hold themselves aloof from their neighbours. 
2 The Indian nanu' for llie Peace river was Ti^ndi'x, “ River of Reav’ers”; Pet itot, E. ; “ En route pour 
la mer ylaciale,’' p. 292 (Paris, 1SS7), whence the name Bea.ver fjiven to the entire tribe and the term 
Tsa’tcii, “Beaver people,” for tlie subdivision living around Fort St. .Tohn. 
3 The Cliipewyan made small birch-bark ciiiocs in Hcarne’s day (lloarne: ftp. cit,, p. 135). Macken- 
zie saw canoes of bireh bark that would carry two persons only amoiii!: the Slave and Dotpil', whereas 
other Staves whom he met had spruce-bark canoes (Mackenzie; Op. cit., pp. 39, 196). Ventzel 
(1801) describes birch -bark canoes from 12 to !S feet Iona among the Slaves (Weiitzel, in Ma.sson 
Op. cit., ser. i, p. 90). 
