His foot was blackened and much
swollen, but I soon satisfied myself that no bones were broken,
because he could wriggle all the toes and move the foot in any
direction.
"You'll be better in three days and all right in a week," I said,
with calm assurance. Then I began with massage. It seemed necessary
in the Indian environment to hum some tune, and I found that the
"Koochy-Koochy" lent itself best to the motion, so it became my
medicine song.
With many "Koochy-Koochy"-ings and much ice-cold water he was
nearly cured in three days, and sound again in a week. But in the
north folk have a habit (not known elsewhere) of improving the
incident. Very soon it was known all along the river that the Indian's
leg was broken, and I had set and healed it in three days. In a
year or two, I doubt not, it will be his neck that was broken, not
once, but in several places.
Grand Island yielded a great many Deermice of the arctic form, a
few Red-backed Voles, and any number of small birds migrant.
As we floated down the river the eye was continually held by tall
and prominent spruce trees that had been cut into peculiar forms
as below. These were known as "lob-sticks," or "lop-sticks," and
are usually the monuments of some distinguished visitor in the
country or records of some heroic achievement. Thus, one would be
pointed out as Commissioner Wrigley's lob-stick, another as John
MacDonald's the time he saved the scow.
The inauguration of a lob-stick is quite a ceremony. Some person
in camp has impressed all with his importance or other claim to
notice. The men, having talked it over, announce that they have
decided on giving him a lob-stick. "Will he make choice of some
prominent tree in view?" The visitor usually selects one back from
the water's edge, often on some far hilltop, the more prominent the
better; then an active young fellow is sent up with an axe to trim
the tree. The more embellishment the higher the honor. On the trunk
they then inscribe the name of the stranger, and he is supposed
to give each of the men a plug of tobacco and a drink of whiskey.
Thus they celebrate the man and his monument, and ever afterwards
it is pointed out as "So-and-so's lob-stick."
It was two months before my men judged that I was entitled to a
lob-stick. We were then on Great Slave Lake where the timber was
small, but the best they could get on a small island was chosen
and trimmed into a monument. They were disappointed however, to
find that I would by no means give whiskey to natives, and my treat
had to take a wholly different form.
