Chapter I: Front Matter

[Frontispiece: "I made a fire, and by melting snow boiled my kettle." (_Page 33._)]

SADDLE, SLED AND
SNOWSHOE:

PIONEERING ON THE SASKATCHEWAN
IN THE SIXTIES.

BY

JOHN McDOUGALL,

Author of "Forest, Lake and Prairie: Twenty Years of Frontier
Life in Western Canada," etc.

_WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY J. E. LAUGHLIN._

TORONTO:
WILLIAM BRIGGS,
WESLEY BUILDINGS.
MONTREAL: C. W. COATES. HALIFAX: S. F. HUESTIS.
1896.

Entered according to Act of the Parliament of Canada, in the year one thousand eight hundred and ninety-six, by WILLIAM BRIGGS, at the Department of Agriculture.

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER I.

Old Fort Edmonton--Early missionaries--Down the Saskatchewan by dog-train--Camp-fire experiences--Arrival at home--Daily occupations

CHAPTER II.

A foraging expedition--Our hungry camp--A welcome feast--Dogs, sleds and buffalo bull in a tangle--In a Wood Cree encampment--Chief Child, Maskepetoon and Ka-kake--Indian hospitality--Incidents of the return trip

CHAPTER III.

Scarcity of food--The winter packet--Start for Edmonton for the eastern mails--A lonely journey--Arrive at Fort Edmonton--Start for home--Camping in a storm--Improvising a "Berlin"--Old Draffan--Sleeping on a dog-sled en route--A hearty welcome home

CHAPTER IV.

Trip to Whitefish Lake--Mr. Woolsey as a dog-driver--Rolling down a side hill--Another trip to Edmonton--Mr. O. B. as a passenger--Perils of travel by ice--Narrow escape of Mr. O. B.--A fraud exposed--Profanity punished--Arrival at Edmonton--Milton and Cheadle--Return to Victoria

CHAPTER V.

Mr. Woolsey's ministrations--An exciting foot-race--Building operations--Gardening--Stolen (?) buffalo tongues--Addled duck eggs as a relish--A lesson in cooking--A lucky shot--Precautions against hostile Indians

CHAPTER VI.

The summer brigade--With the brigade down the Saskatchewan--A glorious panorama--Meet with father and mother on the way to Victoria--Privations of travel--A buffalo crossing--Arrival at Victoria--A church building begun--Peter Erasmus as interpreter

CHAPTER VII.

In search of the Stoneys--An Indian avenger--A Sunday at Fort Edmonton--Drunken Lake carousals--Indian trails--Canyon of the Red Deer--I shoot my father--Amateur surgeons--Prospecting for gold--Peter gets "rattled"--A mysterious shot--Friends or foes?--Noble specimens of the Indian race--A "kodak" needed--Among the Stoneys--Prospecting for a mission site--A massacre of neophytes--An Indian patriarch--Back at Victoria again

CHAPTER VIII.

Provisions diminishing--A buffalo hunt organized--Oxen and Red River carts--Our "buffalo runners"--Meet with Maskepetoon--Maskepetoon shakes hands with his son's murderer--An Indian's strange vow--Instance of Indian watchfulness--"Who-Talks-Past-All-Things"--Come upon the buffalo--An exciting charge--Ki-you-ken-os races the buffalo--Peter's exciting adventure--Buffalo dainties--Return home--War parties--Indian curiosity--Starving Young Bull's "dedication feast"--Missionary labors

CHAPTER IX.

The fall fishing--A relentless tooth-ache--Prairie and forest fire--Attacked by my dogs--A run home--A sleepless night--Father turns dentist--Another visit to Edmonton--Welcome relief--Final revenge on my enemy

CHAPTER X.

Casual visitors--The missionary a "medicine man"--"Hardy dogs and hardier men"--A buffalo hunt organized--"Make a fire! I am freezing!"--I thaw out my companion--Chief Child--Father caught napping--Go with Mr. Woolsey to Edmonton--Encounter between Blackfeet and Stoneys--A "nightmare" scare--My passenger scorched--Rolling down hill--Translating hymns

CHAPTER XI.

Visited by the Wood Stoneys--"Muddy Bull"--A noble Indian couple--Remarkable shooting--Tom and I have our first and only disagreement--A race with loaded dog-sleds--Chased by a wounded buffalo bull--My swiftest foot-race--Building a palisade around our mission home--Bringing in seed potatoes

CHAPTER XII.

Mr. Woolsey's farewell visit to Edmonton--Preparing for a trip to Fort Garry--Indians gathering into our valley--Fight between Crees and Blackfeet--The "strain of possible tragedy"--I start for Fort Garry--Joined by Ka-kake--Sabbath observance--A camp of Saulteaux--An excited Indian--I dilate on the numbers and resources of the white man--We pass Duck Lake--A bear hunt--"Loaded for b'ar"--A contest in athletics--Whip-poor-wills--Pancakes and maple syrup--Pass the site of Birtle--My first and only difference with Ka-kake

CHAPTER XIII.

Fall in with a party of "plain hunters"--Marvellous resources of this great country--A "hunting breed"--Astounding ignorance--Visit a Church of England mission--Have my first square meal of bread and butter in two years--Archdeacon Cochrane--Unexpected sympathy with rebellion and slavery--Through the White Horse Plains--Baptiste's recklessness and its punishment--Reach our destination--Present my letter of introduction to Governor McTavish--Purchasing supplies--"Hudson's Bay blankets"--Old Fort Garry, St. Boniface, Winnipeg, St. John's, Kildonan--A "degenerate" Scot--An eloquent Indian preacher--Baptiste succumbs to his old enemy--Prepare for our return journey

CHAPTER XIV.

We start for home--A stubborn cow--Difficulties of transport--Indignant travellers--Novel method of breaking a horse--Secure provisions at Fort Ellice--Lose one of our cows--I turn detective--Dried meat and fresh cream as a delicacy

CHAPTER XV.

Personnel of our party--My little rat terrier has a novel experience--An Indian horse-thief's visit by night--I shoot and wound him--An exciting chase--Saved by the vigilance of my rat terrier--We reach the South Branch of the Saskatchewan--A rushing torrent--A small skin canoe our only means of transport--Mr. Connor's fears of drowning--Get our goods over

CHAPTER XVI.

A raft of carts--The raft swept away--Succeed in recovering it--Getting our stock over--The emotionless Scot unbends--Our horses wander away--Track them up--Arrive at Carlton--Crossing the North Saskatchewan--Homes for the millions--Fall in with father and Peter--Am sent home for fresh horses--An exhilarating gallop--Home again

CHAPTER XVII.

Improvements about home--Mr. Woolsey's departure--A zealous and self-sacrificing missionary--A travelling college--I feel a twinge of melancholy--A lesson in the luxury of happiness--Forest and prairie fire--Father's visit to the Mountain Stoneys--Indians gathering about our mission--Complications feared

CHAPTER XVIII.

Maskepetoon--Council gatherings--Maskepetoon'a childhood--"Royal born by right Divine"--A father's advice--An Indian philosopher--Maskepetoon as "Peace Chief"--Forgives his father's murderer--Arrival of Rev. R. T. Rundle--Stephen and Joseph--Stephen's eloquent harangue--Joseph's hunting exploits--Types of the shouting Methodist and the High Church ritualist

CHAPTER XIX.

Muh-ka-chees, or "the Fox"--An Indian "dude"--A strange story--How the Fox was transformed--Mr. The-Camp-is-Moving as a magician

CHAPTER XX.

Victoria becomes a Hudson's Bay trading post--An adventure on a raft--The annual fresh meat hunt organized--Among the buffalo--Oliver misses his shot and is puzzled--My experience with a runaway horse--A successful hunt--My "bump of locality" surprises Peter--Home again

CHAPTER XXI.

Father and I visit Fort Edmonton--Peter takes to himself a wife--Mr. Connor becomes school teacher--First school in that part of the country--Culinary operations--Father decides to open a mission at Pigeon Lake--I go prospecting--Engage a Roman Catholic guide--Our guide's sudden "illness"--Through new scenes--Reach Pigeon Lake--Getting out timber for building--Incidents of return trip

CHAPTER XXII.

Another buffalo hunt--Visit Maskepetoon's camp--The old chief's plucky deed--Arrival of a peace party from the Blackfeet--A "peace dance"--Buffalo in plenty--Our mysterious visitor--A party of Blackfeet come upon us--Watching and praying--Arrive home with well-loaded sleds--Christmas festivities

CHAPTER XXIII.

We set out with Maskepetoon for the Blackfoot camp--A wife for a target--Indian scouts--Nearing the Blackfeet--Our Indians don paint and feathers--A picture of the time and place--We enter the Blackfoot camp--Three Bulls--Buffalo Indians--Father describes eastern civilization--The Canadian Government's treatment of the Indians a revelation--I am taken by a war chief as a hostage--Mine host and his seven wives--Bloods and Piegans--I witness a great dance--We leave for home--A sprained ankle--Arrival at the mission