by John Tanner
After this, we started to come to an island called Me-nau-zhe-taw-naun, in the Lake of the Woods, where we had concluded to plant corn, instead of our old fields at Dead River. On our way we stopped at a place to make sugar, then we went to visit the traders, leaving Ais-kaw-ba-wis with our women. It happened that the wife of Gish-kau-ko had left her kettle at the sugar camp, some distance from the place where they were to wait for our return. Some time after the men had gone, Ais-kaw-ba-wis, who lived by himself in a little lodge, pretending to be too holy to go into a common house, or to mingle with men in their ordinary pursuits, sent for the wife of Gish-kau-ko, and when she came to him, he said, “The Great Spirit is not pleased that you should abandon and lose your property. Go, therefore, and get the kettle that you have left at the sugar camp.” The woman obeyed, and he, soon after she had left the camp, took his gun, and under the pretence of going to hunt, went out in a different direction. But he had no sooner got out of sight of the lodges than he turned, and by circuitous route came upon the track of the wife of Gish-kau-ko. She, who had been before annoyed by his particular attentions, and surmised the real object he had in view in sending her for the kettle, kept a look out behind her, and when she saw him come running after her, she began to run also. Just at this time I was returning from the trading-house with the other Indians, when we descried this chase at a distance. It occasioned us much alarm when we saw first a woman, then a man, running with so much apparent earnestness. We thought nothing less than that the Sioux had come to the country, and were murdering our women and children. But when we came a little nearer, the pretended prophet gave over his pursuit of the woman, and came and sat down with us, to drink of the rum which the Indians had brought from the trading-house, and which they gave him very liberally. The woman was, however, after her arrival at home, compelled to give some account of the race, and she acknowledged that Ais-kaw-ba-wis had often sought similar opportunities to be alone with her, though such was her fear of him that she never dared make any disclosure, or offer any other resistance than an attempt to escape by flight. This discovery occasioned no disturbance, and seemed in no degree to diminish the influence of Ais-kaw-ba-wis. A large proportion of the rum we had brought from the trading-house was set apart for him, but when the principal man among us sent for him to come and receive it, he returned for answer, that he could not come. “Tell the chief,” said he, “that if he has any business with me, he can come to my lodge.” The liquor was accordingly carried to him, but its effect seemed to render his disposition somewhat more social and condescending, for about the middle of the night he came staggering into the lodge where I was without the least covering on any part of his body. To me his appearance was ludicrous in the extreme, and I did not refrain from a good deal of irreverent merriment on the occasion.
After this we came to the Lake of the Woods, where I hunted for about a month, then went back into the country I had left, all the Indians remaining behind to clear the ground where they intended planting corn at Me-nau-zhe-tau-naung. I now began to experience the inconveniences resulting from having incurred the ill will of Ais-kaw-ba-wis. He it was who prejudiced the Indians so much against me, and particularly the relatives of my wife, that my situation at Me-nau-zhe-tau-naung was uncomfortable, and I was compelled to return to Red River.
It was about this time that the Scots people, to the number of one hundred or more, arrived to settle at Red River, under the protection of the Hudson’s Bay Company, and among these I saw, for the first time in many years, since I had become a man, a white woman. Soon after my arrival, I was taken into the employment of the Hudson’s Bay Company, and Mr. Hanie, the agent, sent me, accompanied by Mr. Hess, an interpreter, and some men, to kill buffalo. The buffalo were at that time, at a great distance, and the Scots people in great distress for want of provisions. I happened to find and kill two bulls near home, and after sending back the meat, I went on to the herds.
I had hunted here a few days, when our number was increased to four clerks and about twenty men, the latter employed in bringing in the meat I killed to my lodge, whence it was carried in carts to the settlement. All of these lived in my lodge, but one of the clerks named M’Donald was very abusive to my wife and children. Mr. Hess repeatedly checked him for this conduct, but as he continued it, he complained to Mr. Hanie, who sent M’Donald to a place several miles distant where the Indians had killed about twenty buffaloes, which it was not convenient, at present, to bring out, and there he remained by himself for two months, having no other occupation or amusement than to scare the wolves away from the meat. Mr. M’Kenzie was one of the three remaining clerks who lived in my lodge, and he was so different from M’Donald, that at the end of four months, when the greater part of the people were called in to the settlement, he solicited and obtained from Mr. Hanie permission to remain longer with me, to improve himself in the Ojibbeway language, and he did not leave me until after the sugar season.
I killed, in the four months that I hunted for the Hudson’s Bay Company, about one hundred buffaloes, but as part, or all of many of these were eaten in my own lodge, I delivered only forty entire and fat ones to the company’s people, for which Mr. Hanie paid me, in the spring, three hundred and ten dollars. Those Scots labourers who were with me, were much more rough and brutal in their manners than any people I had before seen. Even when they had plenty, they ate like starved dogs, and never failed to quarrel over their meat. The clerks frequently beat and punished them, but they would still quarrel.
Mr. Hanie, and the governor for the Hudson’s Bay Company, proposed to me to build me a house, and engage me permanently in their employment, but I delayed accepting their offer, as I thought it doubtful whether their attempt at settling the country would finally succeed. Some of the Indians whom I had left at the Lake of the Woods had followed me out, spent the winter with me, and returned long ago. I was still by myself at Red River, when Wa-ge-tote came from Me-nau-zhe-tau-naung with a message from my father and mother-in-law. They had lost several of their children by death, and feeling lonely, they sent for me to come to them. This message Wa-ge-tote delivered to me in the presence of the traders, and some other persons, but afterwards he called me out by myself, and said to me, “Do not believe that your father-in-law calls you to Me-nau-zhe-tau-naung, to be at peace, or with any kind intention. When the children were sick, they called Ais-kaw-ba-wis to do something for them, and he having made a chees-suk-kon, said he had called you into his enclosure, and made you confess that you had shot bad medicine at the children, though you were at that time at Red River. He made your father-in-law believe that you had the power of life and death over his children, and he continues to believe, as do most of the Indians of the band, that it was your medicine which killed them. Be assured, therefore, that they call you thither with the design of killing you.” Notwithstanding this admonition, I started immediately, as I knew if I did not they would be but the more confirmed in their unfounded opinion of my culpability.
I had bought a shirt from some of the Scots people at Red River, which I put on as I was about to start on this journey. Probably it was from this I contracted a disease of the skin, which became so troublesome and violent that I was compelled to stop at the Be-gwi-o-nus-ko River. Here I remained for a month, being for a long time unable to move. When I first stopped I set up my lodge on the brink of the river, and after I was unable to walk, I subsisted myself and family by lying in my canoe and fishing. After being placed in my canoe, sometimes I lay there for three or four days without being moved, covering myself with a mat at night. My wife was not so severely affected, being, though very sick, still able to walk. When I began to get a little better, I tried all sorts of medicines I could procure, but none seemed to do me so much good as gun powder, moistened a little, and rubbed upon the sores, which were very large. This disorder, caught originally from the Scotch people, spread among the Indians and killed numbers of them.
After I had recovered, I went up the Be-wi-o-nus-ko, to the smal
l lake of the same name, where I stopped to hunt, and killed plenty of meat. While I remained here, there came one day to my lodge, four young men from our village at Me-nau-zhe-tau-naung. In one of them, who was painted black, I recognized my brother-in-law. The three other children being dead, grief, and a feeling of loneliness, influenced him to leave his father, and start in search of some war party, that he might accompany them against their enemies, and thus have an opportunity of sacrificing, honourably, a life that had become irksome to him. The three young men his companions, being unwilling to see him depart alone, had voluntarily accompanied him. I gave him my horse, and then went up to the Lake of the Woods to my father-in-law, where I remained a few days. As it was then the time when the wild geese, having cast their quills, are unable to fly, we caught great numbers of them.
After four days, I said to the old people, “I cannot remain here, while my little brother has gone crying about, with none to protect him. I know there is danger in the path he will walk, and I ought to follow to show him where it lies. He wishes to join a war party, that he may walk in a dangerous road, but there is often danger where we least expect it.” I knew that Wa-me-gon-a-biew would fall upon this boy, and insult or perhaps kill him on account of his remote relationship to the man who wounded Taw-ga-we-ninne, at Mackinac, or at least with this pretence. Sha-gwaw-koo-sink, hearing my determination, and the reasons I gave for it, said he would accompany me. We started together, and on our arrival at Red River, we heard that Wa-me-gon-a-biew had taken from the boy the horse I gave him, and had already threatened to kill him. I went immediately to Wa-me-gon-a-biew, and a quarrel would probably have taken place at once on account of the young man, had not old Net-no-kwa come between and separated us, as we were about to come to blows. We were all now about to join the Crees and Assinneboins to go against the Sioux, and I cautioned my young brother-in-law to be, on this journey, always watchful of the movements of Wa-me-gon-a-biew. We were about forty men in number when we started from Red River. As we passed along through the Cree and Assinneboin encampments and villages on our route, our party was augmented to the number of two hundred men long before we arrived at Turtle Mountain. While we were encamped near one of the Cree villages, Wa-ge-tote and the principal chiefs being called away to a feast, Wa-me-gon-a-biew began to talk of my brother-in-law, and as I did not like to hear him, I went out and walked about at a distance from the camp. When I thought the chiefs had returned from the feast, I re-entered the camp, but from the expression of concern and interest visible in the faces of those about me, I immediately comprehended that something had happened. I went to search for the young man on whose account particularly I felt anxious, and finding him safe, was returning to my own place, when I discovered in the hands of an old man, who was trying to replace them in their original shape, the splinters and fragments of my new gun. I was at no loss to comprehend the nature of the accident which had deprived me of the use of my gun at a time when it was likely to prove so important to me, and in the first moment of irritation, I seized the barrel, and was walking towards Wa-me-gon-a-biew to beat him with it, when I met Wa-ge-tote, who interfered to prevent me from striking him, though Wa-ge-tote himself, as well as the other chiefs, expressed the greatest dissatisfaction at what he had done.
But notwithstanding the loss of my gun, I did not turn back. Arming myself with my gun barrel in place of war club and spear, I went on. In two days from this camp, we arrived at the head of Turtle Mountain, being now about four hundred men. This was the place agreed upon for the assembling of all who should join in the party, and we had supposed that those we should meet here would be few in number in comparison with ourselves. We were therefore somewhat surprised when we found already on the ground, one thousand Assinneboins, Crees, and Ojibbeways.
We stopped at a little distance, and some communication took place between the chiefs, respecting the ceremony of salutation to be used. It is customary for war parties engaged in the same cause, or friendly to each other, when they meet, to exchange a few shots by way of a sham battle, in which they use all the jumping, the whooping, and yelling of a real fight. But on this occasion both bands were so large, and one so much larger than the other, that the chiefs thought it more prudent to use a different method of exchanging compliments in meeting. It was agreed, on the part of Match-a-to-ge-wub[*], the principal chief, that his young men should all remain in their lodges, and that twenty warriors of our band should salute their encampment by practising the manoeuvres of attacking a village. A large lodge was set up for them to cut in pieces by their firing. I was one of the twenty selected for this performance, having supplied myself with a gun which I procured from a man who turned back. It was not without the utmost exertion of all my strength that I kept even pace with my companions, in running, leaping, loading, and yelling, and though we rested four times, when we arrived at the chief’s lodge, and had blown it to fragments, I was entirely exhausted with fatigue. A man of our own party, imprudently, and without any authority, exposed himself in the village while this salute was in progress, but his clothes were blown and scorched off his back, his lodge shot down, and himself much hurt. But as the exposure had been altogether voluntary on his part, and the notice taken of him rather honourable than otherwise, he had no cause of complaint.
On the first night after we came together, three men of the Ojibbeways were killed. On the next, two horses belonging to the Assinneboins, and on the third, three more. When such numbers of men assemble from different and remote parts of the country, some must be brought into contact between whom old grudges and enmities exist, and it is not surprising that the unstable power and influence of the chiefs should be insufficient to prevent disturbances and bloodshed. On this occasion, men were assembled from a vast extent of country, of dissimilar feelings and dialects, and of the whole fourteen hundred, not one who would acknowledge any authority superior to his own will. It is true that ordinarily they yield a certain deference, and a degree of obedience to the chief each may have undertaken to follow, but this obedience, in most instances, continues no longer than the will of the chief corresponds entirely with the inclination of those he leads. In this party were some who had been a year on their journey to reach this place. Two hundred lodges had their women with them.
Soon after we joined the main body at Turtle Mountain, a Cree of Prairie Fort, adopted me into his family, taking my baggage, and inviting me into his lodge. He called me constantly Ne-je[*], (my friend,) and treated me with great kindness. Many other men who were without lodges, were in like manner taken into the families of those that had.
But a few days had passed, when the little boys commenced, in the first instance a very small number, by kicking at each other in playfulness merely, but it happened that on one side were Assinneboin children only, and on the other Crees and Ojibbeways. By degrees larger and larger boys, and at last men joined in on either side, and what had commenced in play, was like to terminate in a serious and bloody brawl. Match-a-to-ge-wub ran between the combatants, exerted his voice and his hands; afterwards Wa-ge-tote and all the other principal chiefs, but the young men paid little or no regard to them. The excitement which had kindled among them was maddening to rage, and the chiefs were running about in the utmost distress and fear, when an old man, whose head was white as snow, and who was so bent down with age that he walked on two sticks, and looking more like a dog than a man, came out, and though his voice was too feeble to be heard at any distance, he no sooner appeared, than all the Assinneboins desisted entirely from their violence, and the quarrel ended. Of those that were wounded and injured in this affair, only two died immediately, but many were so much injured that they were sent back to their own country. Had not the greater number entered into the affray without their arms, more extensive mischief would have resulted. Though I inquired much, I could neither learn the name, or hear any thing satisfactory of the history of the old man, by whose interference this affair was brought so timely to an end. Vague, and probably very extravagan
t reports, circulated among us respecting him.
CHAPTER XII
Superstitions of the Indians. – Violent and unjust prejudice. – Family misfortunes. – Remarkable tenacity of life in the otter, and some other small animals. – Disturbances between the Hudson’s Bay and North West Fur Companies.
In the evening after this affair, the chiefs walked through the village and addressed all the people. The amount of what they said was to direct, that instead of remaining longer to quarrel with and destroy each other, we should all move on the following morning towards the Sioux country. Accordingly, the camp was broken up, about half the number returning towards home, the remainder continuing on. It was now late in the fall, and we had travelled only two days from Turtle Mountain, when there came on a cold and violent storm of rain and snow. Two horses perished, and many men were near sharing the same fate, but most or all of the Ojibbeways, carrying each man on his back a puk-kwi of birch bark, large enough to afford a partial covering for three men, and all being disposed to extend to the destitute all possible assistance and relief, many of them were sheltered.
