These Large Families Are Fed During The Greatest Part Of The
Year On Fish Which Are Principally Procured At Beaver Lake, About Fifty
Miles Distant.
The fishery, commencing with the first frosts in autumn,
continues abundant till January, and the produce is dragged over the snow
on sledges, each drawn by three dogs and carrying about two hundred and
fifty pounds.
The journey to and from the lake occupies five days and
every sledge requires a driver. About three thousand fish averaging three
pounds apiece were caught by the Hudson's Bay fishermen last season; in
addition to which a few sturgeon were occasionally caught in Pine Island
Lake; and towards the spring a considerable quantity of moose meat was
procured from the Basquiau Hill, sixty or seventy miles distant. The rest
of our winter's provision consisted of geese, salted in the autumn, and
of dried meats and pemmican obtained from the provision posts on the
plains of the Saskatchewan. A good many potatoes are also raised at this
post and a small supply of tea and sugar is brought from the depot at
York Factory. The provisions obtained from these various sources were
amply sufficient in the winter of 1819-20; but through improvidence this
post has in former seasons been reduced to great straits.
Many of the labourers and a great majority of the agents and clerks
employed by the two Companies have Indian or half-breed wives, and the
mixed offspring thus produced has become extremely numerous.
These metifs, or, as the Canadians term them, bois brules, are upon the
whole a good-looking people and, where the experiment has been made, have
shown much aptness in learning and willingness to be taught; they have
however been sadly neglected.
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