The men were much bothered as all plans were upset.
After waiting about two weeks, some of the Indians and half-breeds
advised Anderson to consult the conjuring woman, Mash-kou-tay
Ish-quay (Prairie woman) a Flathead from Stuart Lake, B. C. He
went and paid her some tobacco. She drummed and conjured all night.
She came in the morning and told him: "The packet is at the foot
of a rapid now, where there is open water; the snow is deep and
the travelling heavy, but it will be here to-morrow when the sun
is at that point."
Sure enough, it all fell out as she had told. This woman married
a Hudson's Bay man named MacDonald, and he brought her to Lachine,
where she bore him 3 sons; then he died of small-pox, and Sir
George Simpson gave orders that she should be sent up to Abitibi
and there pensioned for as long as she lived. She was about 75 at
the time of the incident. She many times gave evidence of clairvoyant
power. The priest said he "knew about it, and that she was helped
by the devil."
A gruesome picture of Indian life is given in the following incident.
One winter, 40 or 50 years ago, a band of Algonquin Indians at
Wayabimika all starved to death except one squaw and her baby; she
fled from the camp, carrying the child, thinking to find friends
and help at Nipigon House. She got as far as a small lake near
Deer Lake, and there discovered a cache, probably in a tree. This
contained one small bone fish-hook. She rigged up a line, but had
no bait. The wailing of the baby spurred her to action. No bait,
but she had a knife; a strip of flesh was quickly cut from her
own leg, a hole made through the ice, and a fine jack-fish was the
food that was sent to this devoted mother. She divided it with the
child, saving only enough for bait. She stayed there living on fish
until spring, then safely rejoined her people.
The boy grew up to be a strong man, but was cruel to his mother,
leaving her finally to die of starvation. Anderson knew the woman;
she showed him the sear where she cut the bait.
A piece of yet, more ancient history was supplied him in Northern
Ontario, and related to me thus:
Anderson was going to Kakabonga in June, 1879, and camped one
night on the east side of Birch Lake on the Ottawa, about 50 miles
north-east of Grand Lake Post.
He and his outfit of two canoes met Pah-pah-tay, chief of the Grand
Lake Indians, travelling with his family. He called Anderson's
attention to the shape of the point which had one good landing-place,
a little sandy bay, and told him the story he heard from his people
of a battle that was fought there with the Iroquois long, long ago.
