by Mayne Reid
CHAPTER I
THE FUR COUNTRIES
Boy reader, you have heard of the Hudson's Bay Company? Ten to one youhave worn a piece of fur which it has provided for you; if not, yourpretty little sister has--in her muff, or her boa, or as a trimming forher winter dress. Would you like to know something of the country whencecome these furs?--of the animals whose backs have been stripped toobtain them? As I feel certain that you and I are old friends, I makebold to answer for you--yes. Come, then! let us journey together to the"Fur Countries;" let us cross them from south to north.
A vast journey it will be. It will cost us many thousand miles oftravel. We shall find neither railway-train, nor steamboat, norstagecoach, to carry us on our way. We shall not even have the help of ahorse. For us no hotel shall spread its luxurious board; no road-sideinn shall hang out its inviting sign and "clean beds;" no roof of anykind shall offer us its hospitable shelter. Our table shall be a rock, alog, or the earth itself; our lodging a tent; and our bed the skin of awild beast. Such are the best accommodations we can expect upon ourjourney. Are you still ready to undertake it? Does the prospect notdeter you?
No--I hear you exclaim--I shall be satisfied with the table--what care Ifor mahogany? With the lodging--I can tent like an Arab. With thebed--fling feathers to the wind!
Enough, brave boy! you shall go with me to the wild regions of the"North-west," to the far "fur countries" of America. But, first--a wordabout the land through which we are going to travel.
Take down your atlas. Bend your eye upon the map of North America. Notetwo large islands--one upon the right side, Newfoundland; another uponthe left, Vancouver. Draw a line from one to the other; it will nearlybisect the continent. North of that line you behold a vast territory.How vast? You may take your scissors, and clip fifty Englands out of it!There are lakes there in which you might _drown_ England, or make anisland of it! Now, you may form some idea of the vastness of that regionknown as the "fur countries."
Will you believe me, when I tell you that all this immense tract is awilderness--a howling wilderness, if you like a poetical name? It iseven so. From north to south, from ocean to ocean--throughout all thatvast domain, there is neither town nor village--hardly anything that canbe dignified with the name of "settlement." The only signs ofcivilisation to be seen are the "forts," or trading posts of theHudson's Bay Company; and these "signs" are few and far--hundreds ofmiles--between.
For inhabitants, the country has less than ten thousand white men, the_employes_ of the Company; and its native people are Indians of manytribes, living far apart, few in numbers, subsisting by the chase, andhalf starving for at least a third part of every year! In truth, theterritory can hardly be called "inhabited." There is not a man to everyten miles; and in many parts of it you may travel hundreds of mileswithout seeing a face, red, white, or black!
The physical aspect is, therefore, entirely wild. It is very differentin different parts of the territory. One tract is peculiar. It has beenlong known as the "Barren Grounds." It is a tract of vast extent. Itlies north-west from the shores of Hudson's Bay, extending nearly to theMackenzie River. Its rocks are _primitive_. It is a land of hills andvalleys--of deep dark lakes and sharp-running streams. It is a woodlessregion. No timber is found there that deserves the name. No trees butglandular dwarf birches, willows, and black spruce, small and stunted.Even these only grow in isolated valleys. More generally the surface iscovered with coarse sand--the _debris_ of granite or quartz-rock--uponwhich no vegetable, save the lichen or the moss, can find life andnourishment.
In one respect these "Barren Grounds" are unlike the deserts of Africa:they are well watered. In almost every valley there is a lake; andthough many of these are land-locked, yet do they contain fish ofseveral species. Sometimes these lakes communicate with each other bymeans of rapid and turbulent streams passing through narrow gorges; andlines of those connected lakes form the great rivers of the district.
Such is a large portion of the Hudson's Bay territory. Most of theextensive peninsula of Labrador partakes of a similar character; andthere are other like tracts west of the Rocky Mountain range in the"Russian possessions."
Yet these "Barren Grounds" have their denizens. Nature has formedanimals that delight to dwell there, and that are never found in morefertile regions. Two ruminating creatures find sustenance upon themosses and lichens that cover their cold rocks: they are the caribou(reindeer) and the musk-ox. These, in their turn, become the food andsubsistence of preying creatures. The wolf, in all its varieties ofgrey, black, white, pied, and dusky, follows upon their trail. The"brown bear"--a large species, nearly resembling the "grizzly"--is foundonly in the Barren Grounds; and the great "Polar bear" comes withintheir borders, but the latter is a dweller upon their shores alone, andfinds his food among the finny tribes of the seas that surround them. Inmarshy ponds, existing here and there, the musk-rat builds his house,like that of his larger cousin, the beaver. Upon the water sedge hefinds subsistence; but his natural enemy, the wolverene, skulks in thesame neighbourhood.
The "Polar hare" lives upon the leaves and twigs of the dwarfbirch-tree; and this, transformed into its own white flesh, becomes thefood of the Arctic fox. The herbage, sparse though it be, does not growin vain. The seeds fall to the earth, but they are not suffered todecay. They are gathered by the little lemmings and meadow-mice, who, intheir turn, become the prey of two species of _mustelidae_, the ermineand vison weasels. Have the fish of the lakes no enemy? Yes--a terribleone in the Canada otter. The mink-weasel, too, pursues them; and insummer, the osprey, the great pelican, the cormorant, and thewhite-headed eagle.
These are the _fauna_ of the Barren Grounds. Man rarely ventures withintheir boundaries. The wretched creatures who find a living there are theEsquimaux on their coasts, and a few Chippewa Indians in the interior,who hunt the caribou, and are known as "caribou-eaters." Other Indiansenter them only in summer, in search of game, or journeying from pointto point; and so perilous are these journeyings, that numbers frequentlyperish by the way. There are no white men in the Barren Grounds. The"Company" has no commerce there. No fort is established in them: soscarce are the fur-bearing animals of these parts, their skins would notrepay the expense of a "trading post."
Far different are the "wooded tracts" of the fur countries. These liemostly in the southern and central regions of the Hudson's Bayterritory. There are found the valuable beaver and the wolverene thatpreys upon it. There dwells the American hare with its enemy the Canadalynx. There are the squirrels, and the beautiful martens (sables) thathunt them from tree to tree. There are found the foxes of every variety,the red, the cross, and the rare and highly-prized silver-fox, whoseshining skin sells for its weight in gold! There, too, the black bearyields its fine coat to adorn the winter carriage, the holsters of thedragoon, and the shako of the grenadier. There the fur-bearing animalsexist in greatest plenty, and many others whose skins are valuable incommerce, as the moose, the wapiti, and the wood-bison.
But there is also a "prairie" district in the fur countries. The greattable prairies of North America, that slope eastward from the RockyMountains, also extend northward into the Hudson's Bay territory. Theygradually grow narrower, however, as you proceed farther north, until,on reaching the latitude of the Great Slave Lake, they end altogether.This "prairie-land" has its peculiar animals. Upon it roams the buffalo,the prong-horned antelope, and the mule-deer. There, too, may be seenthe "barking wolf" and the "swift fox." It is the favourite home of themarmots, and the gauffres or sand-rats; and there, too, the noblest ofanimals, the horse, runs wild.
West of this prairie tract is a region of far different aspect--theregion of the Rocky Mountains. This stupendous chain, sometimes calledthe Andes of North America, continues throughout the fur countries fromtheir southern limits to the shores of the Arctic Sea. Some of its peaksoverlook the waters of that sea itself, towering up near the coast. Manyof these, even in southern latitudes, carry the "eternal snow." This"mountain-chain" is, in places, of great
breadth. Deep valleys lie inits embrace, many of which have never been visited by man. Some aredesolate and dreary; others are oaeses of vegetation, which fascinate thetraveller whose fortune it has been, after toiling among naked rocks, togaze upon their smiling fertility.
These lovely wilds are the favourite home of many strange animals. Theargali, or mountain-sheep, with his huge curving horns, is seen there;and the shaggy wild goat bounds along the steepest cliffs. The blackbear wanders through the wooded ravines; and his fiercer congener, the"grizzly"--the most dreaded of all American animals--drags his huge bodyalong the rocky declivities.
Having crossed the mountains, the fur countries extend westward to thePacific. There you encounter barren plains, treeless and waterless;rapid rivers, that foam through deep, rock-bound channels; and a countryaltogether rougher in aspect, and more mountainous, than that lying tothe east of the great chain. A warmer atmosphere prevails as youapproach the Pacific, and in some places forests of tall trees cover theearth. In these are found most of the fur-bearing animals; and, onaccount of the greater warmth of the climate, the true _felidae_--thelong-tailed cats--here wander much farther north than upon the easternside of the continent. Even so far north as the forests of Oregon theseappear in the forms of the cougar and the ounce.
But it is not our intention at present to cross the Rocky Mountains. Ourjourney will lie altogether on the eastern side of that great chain. Itwill extend from the frontiers of civilization to the shores of theArctic Sea. It is a long and perilous journey, boy reader; but as wehave made up our minds to it, let us waste no more time in talking, butset forth at once. You are ready? Hurrah!
