Nay, More Than Once Instance Came Under Our Observation Of The Master Of A Post Having Permitted A Voyager To Take To Wife A Poor Child That Had Scarcely Attained The Age Of Ten Years.

The masters of posts and wintering partners of the Companies deemed this criminal indulgence to the vices of their servants necessary to stimulate them to exertion for the interest of their respective concerns.

Another practice may also be noticed as showing the state of moral feeling on these subjects amongst the white residents of the fur countries. It was not very uncommon amongst the Canadian voyagers for one woman to be common to and maintained at the joint expense of two men; nor for a voyager to sell his wife, either for a season or altogether, for a sum of money proportioned to her beauty and good qualities but always inferior to the price of a team of dogs.

The country around Cumberland House is flat and swampy and is much intersected by small lakes. Limestone is found everywhere under a thin stratum of soil and it not unfrequently shows itself above the surface. It lies in strata generally horizontal but in one spot near the fort dipping to the northward at an angle of 40 degrees. Some portions of this rock contain very perfect shells. With respect to the vegetable productions of the district the Populus trepida, or aspen, which thrives in moist situations, is perhaps the most abundant tree on the banks of the Saskatchewan and is much prized as firewood, burning well when cut green. The Populus balsamifera or taccamahac, called by the Crees matheh meteos, or ugly poplar, in allusion to its rough bark and naked stem, crowned in an aged state with a few distorted branches, is scarcely less plentiful. It is an inferior firewood and does not been well unless when cut in the spring and dried during the summer; but it affords a great quantity of potash. A decoction of its resinous buds has been sometimes used by the Indians with success in cases of snow-blindness, but its application to the inflamed eye produces much pain. Of pines the white spruce is the most common here: the red and black spruce, the balsam of Gilead fir, and Banksian pine also occur frequently. The larch is found only in swampy spots and is stunted and unhealthy. The canoe birch attains a considerable size in this latitude but from the great demand for its wood to make sledges it has become rare. The alder abounds on the margin of the little grassy lakes so common in the neighbourhood. A decoction of its inner bark is used as an emetic by the Indians who also extract from it a yellow dye. A great variety of willows occur on the banks of the streams and the hazel is met with sparingly in the woods. The sugar maple, elm, ash, and the arbor vitae,* termed by the Canadian voyagers cedar, grow on various parts of the Saskatchewan but that river seems to form their northern boundary. Two kinds of prunus also grow here, one of which,** a handsome small tree, produces a black fruit having a very astringent taste whence the term choke-cherry applied to it. The Crees call it tawquoymeena, and esteemed it to be when dried and bruised a good addition to pemmican. The other species*** is a less elegant shrub but is said to bear a bright red cherry of a pleasant sweet taste. Its Cree name is passeeaweymeenan, and it is known to occur as far north as Great Slave Lake.

(*Footnote. Thuya occidentalis.)

(**Footnote. Prunus virginiana.)

(***Footnote. Prunus pensylvanica.)

The most esteemed fruit of the country however is the produce of the Aronia ovalis. Under the name of meesasscootoomena it is a favourite dish at most of the Indian feasts and, mixed with pemmican, it renders that greasy food actually palatable. A great variety of currants and gooseberries are also mentioned by the natives under the name of sappoommeena but we only found three species in the neighbourhood of Cumberland House. The strawberry, called by the Crees oteimeena, or heart-berry, is found in abundance and rasps are common on the sandy banks of the rivers. The fruits hitherto mentioned fall in the autumn but the following berries remained hanging on the bushes in the spring and are considered as much mellowed by exposure to the colds in winter. The red whortleberry (Vaccinium vitis idea) is found everywhere but is most abundant in rocky places. It is aptly termed by the Crees weesawgummeena, sour-berry. The common cranberry (Oxycoccos palustris) is distinguished from the preceding by its growing on moist sphagnous spots and is hence called maskoegomeena, swamp-berry. The American guelder rose whose fruit so strongly resembles the cranberry is also common. There are two kinds of it (Viburnum oxycoccos and edule) one termed by the natives peepoonmeena, winter-berry, and the other mongsoameena, moose-berry. There is also a berry of a bluish white colour, the produce of the white cornel tree, which is named musquameena, bear-berry, because these animals are said to fatten on it. The dwarf Canadian cornel bears a corymb of red berries which are highly ornamental to the woods throughout the country but are not otherwise worthy of notice for they have an insipid farinaceous taste and are seldom gathered.

The Crees extract some beautiful colours from several of their native vegetables. They dye their porcupine quills a beautiful scarlet with the roots of two species of bed-straw (Galium tinctorium and boreale) which they indiscriminately term sawoyan. The roots, after being carefully washed, are boiled gently in a clean copper kettle, and a quantity of the juice of the moose-berry, strawberry, cranberry, or arctic raspberry, is added together with a few red tufts of pistils of the larch. The porcupine quills are plunged into the liquor before it becomes quite cold and are soon tinged of a beautiful scarlet.

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