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LORDS
OF THE
NORTH
BY
A. C. LAUT
TORONTOWILLIAM BRIGGS
Entered according to Act of the Parliament of Canada, in the year onethousand nine hundred, by WILLIAM BRIGGS, at the Department ofAgriculture.
LORDS of the NORTH
by A. C. LAUT]
TO THE
Pioneers and their Descendants
WHOSE
HEROISM WON THE LAND,
THIS WORK
IS RESPECTFULLY DEDICATED.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT.
The author desires to express thanks to pioneers and fur traders of theWest for information, details and anecdotes bearing on the old life,which are herein embodied; and would also acknowledge the assistance ofthe history of the North-West Company and manuscripts of the_Bourgeois_, compiled by Senator L. R. Masson; and the value of suchearly works as those of Dr. George Bryce, Gunn, Hargraves, Ross andothers.
THE TRAPPER'S DEFIANCE.
"The adventurous spirits, who haunted the forest and plain, grew fond oftheir wild life and affected a great contempt for civilization."
You boxed-up, mewed-up artificials, Pent in your piles of mortar and stone, Hugging your finely spun judicials, Adorning externals, externals alone, Vaunting in prideful ostentation Of the Juggernaut car, called Civilization-- What know ye of freedom and life and God?
Monkeys, that follow a showman's string, Know more of freedom and less of care, Cage birds, that flutter from perch to ring, Have less of worry and surer fare. Cursing the burdens, yourselves have bound, In a maze of wants, running round and round-- Are ye free men, or manniken slaves?
Costly patches, adorning your walls, Are all of earth's beauty ye care to know; But ye strut about in soul-stifled halls To play moth-life by a candle-glow-- What soul has space for upward fling, What manhood room for shoulder-swing, Coffined and cramped from the vasts of God?
The Spirit of Life, O atrophied soul, In trappings of ease is not confined; That touch from Infinite Will 'neath the Whole In Nature's temple, not man's, is shrined! From hovel-shed come out and be strong! Be ye free! Be redeemed from the wrong, Of soul-guilt, I charge you as sons of God!
INTRODUCTION.
I, Rufus Gillespie, trader and clerk for the North-West Company, whichruled over an empire broader than Europe in the beginning of thiscentury, and with Indian allies and its own riotous _Bois-Brules_,carried war into the very heart of the vast territory claimed by itsrivals, the Honorable Hudson's Bay Company, have briefly related a fewstirring events of those boisterous days. Should the account here setdown be questioned, I appeal for confirmation to that missionary amongnorthern tribes, the famous priest, who is the son of the ill-fated girlstolen by the wandering Iroquois. Lord Selkirk's narration of lawlessconflict with the Nor'-Westers and the verbal testimony of Red Riversettlers, who are still living, will also substantiate what I havestated; though allowance must be made for the violent partisan leaningof witnesses, and from that, I--as a Nor'-Wester--do not claim to befree.
On the charges and counter-charges of cruelty bandied between white menand red, I have nothing to say. Remembering how white soldiers fromeastern cities took the skin of a native chief for a trophy of victory,and recalling the fiendish glee of Mandanes over a victim, I can onlyconclude that neither race may blamelessly point the finger of reproachat the other.
Any variations in detail from actual occurrences as seen by my own eyesare solely for the purpose of screening living descendants of thosewhose lives are here portrayed from prying curiosity; but, in truth,many experiences during the thrilling days of the fur companies were fartoo harrowing for recital. I would fain have tempered some of theincidents herein related to suit the sentiments of a milk-and-water age;but that could be done only at the cost of truth.
There is no French strain in my blood, so I have not that passionatedevotion to the wild daring of _l'ancien regime_, in which many of myrugged companions under _Les Bourgeois de la Compagnie du Nord-Ouest_gloried; but he would be very sluggish, indeed, who could not look backwith some degree of enthusiasm to the days of gentlemen adventurers inno-man's-land, in a word, to the workings of the great fur tradingcompanies. Theirs were the trappers and runners, the _Coureurs des Bois_and _Bois-Brules_, who traversed the immense solitudes of the pathlesswest; theirs, the brigades of gay _voyageurs_ chanting hilariousrefrains in unison with the rhythmic sweep of paddle blades andfollowing unknown streams until they had explored from St. Lawrence toMacKenzie River; and theirs, the merry lads of the north, blazing atrack through the wilderness and leaving from Atlantic to Pacific lonelystockaded fur posts--footprints for the pioneers' guidance. Thewhitewashed palisades of many little settlements on the rivers and lakesof the far north are poor relics of the fur companies' ancient grandeur.That broad domain stretching from Hudson Bay to the Pacific Ocean,reclaimed from savagery for civilization, is the best monument to theunheralded forerunners of empire.
RUFUS GILLESPIE.
WINNIPEG--ONE TIME FORT GARRY FORMERLY RED RIVER SETTLEMENT,_19th June, 18--_
Transcriber's note: Minor typos have been corrected.
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