A narrative of the captivity and adventures of John Tanner

by John Tanner

  Very early the next morning I started out to hunt, and as I knew very well how the old woman would behave when she came to a knowledge of her misfortune. I did not wish to reach home until late at night. When approaching the place where our lodge had been, I heard the old woman scolding and beating the little girl. At length, when I went to the fire, she asked me why I had not killed her when I first came home and found the lodge burned down. “Since you did not,” said she, “I must now kill her.” “Oh my mother do not kill me, and I will pay you for all you have lost.” “What have you to give? how can you pay me?” said the old woman. “I will give you the Manito,” said the little girl, “the great Manito shall come down to reward you, if you do not kill me.” We were now destitute of provisions, and almost naked, but we determined to go to Aneeb’s trading-house, at Ke-new-kau-neshe way-boant, where we obtained credit for the amount of one pack of beaver skins, and with the blankets and cloth which we purchased in this way, we returned to We-ma-gon-a-biew’s lodge, whence he and his wife accompanied us to our own place.

  We commenced to repair our loss by building a small grass lodge in which to shelter ourselves while we should prepare the pukkwi for a new wigwam[*]. The women were very industrious in making these, and none more active than Skwah-shish, the Bowwetig girl. At night, also, when it was too dark to hunt, Wa-me-gon-a-biew and myself assisted at this labour. In a few days our lodge was completed, and Wa-me-gon-a-biew, having killed three elks, left us for his own home.

  After a little time, plenty and good humour were restored. One evening the old woman called to her the little Bowwetig girl, and asked her if she remembered what promise she had made to her when she was whipped for burning the lodge. Skwah-shish could make no answer, but the old woman took the opportunity to admonish her of the impropriety of using the name of the Deity in a light and irreverent manner.

  CHAPTER VI

  Failure of an attempt to accompany a war-party to the Missouri. – Removal to Elk River. – Joined in my hunting grounds by some Naudoways, from Lower Canada. – Hospitality of the Crees. – Practice of medicine. – Dispute with a Naudoway. – Band of Tuskwaw-go-nees. – Brine Spring, on Elk River. – I receive a severe injury by falling from my horse. – Involved in difficulty by my foster brother. – Habits of the moose-deer. – Range of the moose, the elk, and the reindeer.

  At this place we remained until spring, when, at the commencement of the sugar season, we went to Ke-nu-kau-ne-she-way-boant. We applied to the Indians there to give us some trees to make sugar. They gave us a place where were a few small trees, but the old woman was dissatisfied, and refused to remain. We therefore travelled two days by ourselves, until we found a good place to make sugar, and in the same district were plenty of beavers, as well as birch for troughs. When we had been here long enough to have finished making sugar, Wa-me-gon-a-biew came to us in distress, with his father-in-law, and all his large family. We were able to give them something, but old Net-no-kwa did not present him ten of my largest and best beaver skins without remarking, “these, and many more, have all been killed by my little son, who is much weaker and less experienced than either yourself or Wa-me-gon-a-biew.” She was not very well pleased in giving, and the old man was a little ashamed to receive her present. After a few days they left us for the trading-house, and Waw-be-be-nais-sa joined us when we started in company to go to the Mouse River trading-house. Leaves were out on the trees, the bark peeled, and we were killing sturgeons in the rivers, when there came a snow more than knee deep, and the frost was so severe that the trees cracked as in the middle of winter. The river was frozen over, and many trees were killed.

  At the Mouse River trading-house, the Assinneboins, Crees, and Ojibbeways, were again assembling to go to join the Mandans in making war upon the A-gutch-o-ninne-wug[*], the people I before mentioned. This time I wished to have accompanied them, and I said to the old woman, “I will go with my uncles, who are going to the Mandans.” She tried to dissuade me, but finding me obstinate, took away my gun and moccasins. This opposition rather increased my ardour, and I followed the Indians, barefoot and unarmed, trusting that some among them would supply me, but in this I was mistaken for they drove me back, and would by no means allow me to accompany them. I was irritated and dissatisfied, but I had no alternative but to return, and remain with the women and children. I did not ask the old woman for my gun again, but taking my traps, I went from home and did not return until I had caught beavers enough to purchase one. When I had done so, my anxiety to overtake the war-party had subsided. Many of the women they had left behind now began to be hungry, and it was not without great exertion on my part, and that of the very few young boys and old men who were left, that their wants could be supplied.

  The war-party at length returned, having accomplished little or nothing. We then left them, and in company with one man, a relative of Net-no-kwa, called Wau-zhe-gaw-maish-kum, (he that walks along the shore), we started to go to Elk River. This man had two wives. The name of one was Me-sau-bis, (goslin’s down.) He was also accompanied by another distinguished hunter, called Kau-wa-be-nit-to, (he that starts them all.) Our course from Mouse River was very near due north, and as we had six horses, we travelled with considerable rapidity, but it was many days before we reached the head of Elk River. Here Wau-zhe-gaw-maish-kum left us to go to the Missouri on a war-party, but Kau-wa-be-nit-to remained, and gave us always the finest and best of the game he killed. He directed me also to a beaver dam and pond, at some distance, to which I went one day at evening, and having sat down I found a road which the beavers were then using to bring timber into the pond. By this road I sat down to watch, supposing I should soon see them pass one way or the other. I had scarce sat down when I heard, at no great distance, a sound which I knew was that made by a woman in dressing skins. I was a little alarmed, as I knew of no Indians in that quarter, and was apprehensive that some of an unfriendly tribe might have come to encamp there. But being determined not to return home ignorant who and what they were, I took my gun in my hands, in the position which would enable me to fire immediately, and proceeded cautiously along the path to examine. My eyes were commonly directed considerably ahead, but I had not walked far, when looking to one side, I saw in the bushes, close to my side, and not one step from the path, a naked and painted Indian, lying flat upon his belly, but, like myself, holding his gun in the attitude of firing. My eyes no sooner fell upon him, than simultaneously, and almost without knowing what I did, I sprang to the other side of the path, and pointed my gun directly at him. This movement he answered by a hearty laugh, which immediately removed my apprehensions, and he soon arose and addressed me in the Ojibbeway language. Like myself, he had supposed no other Indians than his own family were, at that time, in the country, and he had been walking from his own lodge, which stood very near to the beaver pond, when he was surprised to perceive a man approaching him through the bushes. He had first perceived me, and concealed himself, not knowing whether I was a friend or an enemy. After some conversation he returned home with me, and Net-no-kwa discovered that he was a relative of hers. The family of this man remained with us about ten days, and afterwards went to encamp by themselves, at a distance.

  I was now left, for the second time, with the prospect of spending the winter alone, with the exception of those of our own family. But before the commencement of cold weather there came from Mo-ne-ong, (Montreal) seven Naudoway hunters, one of them a nephew of Net-no-kwa. They remained with us, and in the fall and early part of winter, we killed great numbers of beaver. Five of the Naudoways I surpassed in hunting, and though they had ten traps each, and I only six, I caught more beavers than they did. Two of the seven men could beat me at almost any thing. In the course of the winter, two more Naudoways came to our camp, who were in the interest and employ of the company called by the Indians Ojibbeway Way-met-e-goosh-she-wug, (The Chippeway Frenchmen.) After these had been some time with us, the game was exhausted, and we began to be hungry. We agreed all to go one day in se
arch of buffaloes. At night, all had returned except a tall young man, and a very small old man, of the Naudoways. Next day the tall man came home, bringing a new buffalo robe, and having on a handsome pair of new moccasins. He said he had fallen in with seven lodges of Crees, that at first they had not known him, and it was with great difficulty he had made them understand him, but being received into one of the lodges, and fed, and treated with kindness, he had remained all night. In the morning, he folded up the buffalo robe they had given him to sleep on, and would have left it, but they told him they had given it to him, and observing, at the same time, that his moccasins were not very good, one of the women had given him a pair of new ones. This kind of hospitality is much practised among Indians who have had but little intercourse with the whites, and it is among the foremost of the virtues which the old men inculcate upon the minds of children in their evening conversations. The Naudoway had been little accustomed to such treatment in the country from which he came.

  He had not been long at home before the old man arrived, who pretended that he had seen fifty lodges of Assinneboins, and had been kindly received by them, and although he had nothing to show in proof of his assertions, that they had plenty of meat, and were disposed to be very hospitable. He persuaded us that he had better go to join them. In the morning we were all ready to accompany him, but he said, “I cannot go yet, I have first to mend my moccasins.” One of the young men, that there might be no unnecessary delay, gave him a pair of new moccasins, but in the next place, he said he must cut off a piece of his blanket, and make himself some mittens. One of them, who had some pieces of blanket, assisted him to make some mittens, but he still invented excuses for delaying his departure, most of which resulted in the supplying, by some one of the party, some of his little wants. At length we began to suspect him of lying, and having sent some one to follow his trail, we ascertained that he had neither travelled far, seen Indians, nor eaten a mouthful since he left home.

  Knowing it would be in vain to search for the fifty lodges of Assinneboins, we went in pursuit of the Crees, whom our Naudoway had seen, but we unexpectedly met with another band of the same tribe. These were strangers to us, but inquiring for their chief, we went into his lodge and sat down. The women immediately hung the kettle over the fire, and then took out of a sack a substance which was then new and unknown to all of us, and which excited in our party considerable curiosity. When the food was placed before us, we found it consisted of little fishes, scarce an inch long, and all of the same size. When put into the kettle, they were in large masses, frozen together. These little fishes, with the taking and eating of which we afterwards became familiar, are found in small holes which remain open in the shallow ponds, crowded together in such numbers that one may scoop up hundreds of them at once with the hands. After we had finished our meal, the woman who appeared to be the principal wife of the chief, examined our moccasins, and gave us each a new pair. These people were on a journey and soon left us. We now determined to make a sunjegwun, and deposit such of our property as would impede us in a long journey, and go to the plains in pursuit of buffalo. We accordingly followed the path of the Crees, and overtook them in the Prairie.

  It was about the middle of winter when we arrived among them, and soon afterwards our tall Naudoway fell sick. His friends applied to an old medicine man of the Crees, called Muk-kwah, (the bear,) requesting him to do something for his relief. “Give me,” said the old man, “ten beaver skins, and I will use my art to relieve him.” As we had left our peltries behind, and killed but few beaver since we started, we could raise only nine, but we gave him a piece of cloth which was more than equal in value to one beaver, and he consented to begin. He prepared his lodge for the first days’ practice before the patient was admitted. He then being brought in, was seated on a mat near the fire. Old Muk-kwah, who was a ventriloquist of but indifferent powers, and a medicine man of no great fame, imitated, as well as he could, various sounds, and endeavoured to make those standing by believe they proceeded from the breast of the sick man. At length he said he heard the sound of bad fire in the breast of the Naudoway, and putting one hand to his breast, the other and his mouth to the back, he continued for some time blowing and rubbing, when he, as if by accident, dropped a little ball upon the ground. After again blowing and rubbing, alternately dropping the little ball, and rubbing it between his hands, he at length threw it into the fire, where it burned, with a little whizzing noise, like damp powder. This did not surprise me at all, as I saw he had taken the precaution to sprinkle a little powder on that part of the floor of the lodge where the ball fell. Perceiving, probably, that what he had now done was not likely to prove satisfactory to his employers, he pretended that there was a snake in the breast of the sick man which he could not remove till the following day, when with similar preparations, and similar mummeries, he seemed to draw out of the body of the sick man, a small snake. One of his hands he kept for some time on the place from which he pretended to have drawn the snake, as he said the hole could not close immediately. The snake he refused to destroy, but laid it carefully aside for preservation lest, as he said, it should get into somebody else. This ill-conducted imposition did not fail to excite the ridicule of the Naudoways, and had no perceptible effect upon the sick man. They soon learned to imitate his several noises, and made him a subject for sarcasm and ridicule. Some of the more sensible and respectable men among the Crees advised us to have nothing more to say to Muk-kwah, as he was esteemed but a fool among them.

  It was about this time that I had some difficulty with a Naudoway Indian who was hunting for the Ojibbeway Way-me-ta-goo-she-wug. He had arrived since I had in the country, and his right to hunt in any part of it was certainly no better than mine. He had, in one or two instances, complained of me for hunting where he said I had no right to hunt. Having now found a gang of beavers, I set my traps for them, and, as usual, left them till the next day. On going next morning I found he had followed my trail, taken up all my traps, thrown them into snow, and set his own in place of them. He had caught but one beaver, which I did not hestiate to carry home as my own, and throwing all his traps in the snow, I set mine again as before. The affair soon became public, but all the band, even his own friends, the Naudoways, sided against him, and assured me they would support me in the course I had taken. In affairs of this kind, the customs of the tribe are as a law to the Indians, and any one who ventures to depart from them, can expect neither support nor countenance. It is rare that oppression or injustice in affairs of private right between man and man, take place among the Indians.

  We stayed about one month in the prairie, then returned to the lodge where we had left the old woman, thence to our trading-house on Elk River. Here a lodge of Tus-kwaw-go-mees from Canada came into our neighbourhood. I had now separated from the Naudoways and was living by myself. When I first visited the Tus-kwaw-go-mees, and went into their lodge, I did not know who they were. The man presently went out, brought in my snow-shoes, and placed them by the fire to dry and finding they were a little out of repair, he directed an old man to mend them. He then proposed to go and hunt with me until they should be repaired. He killed, in the course of the day, several beavers, all of which he gave me. The kindness of this family of Tus-kwaw-go-mees continued as long as we remained near them. Their language is like that of the Ojibbeways, differing from it only as the Cree differs from that of the Mus-ke-goes.

  When the sugar season arrived, I went to Elk River and made my camp about two miles below the fort. The sugar trees, called by the Indians she-she-ge-ma-winzh, are of the same kind as are commonly found in the bottom lands on the Upper Mississippi, and are called by the whites “river maple.” They are large, but scattered and for this reason we made two camps, one on each side of the river. I remained by myself in one, and in the other were the old woman and the little children. While I was making sugar, I killed plenty of birds, ducks, geese, and beaver. There was near my camp a large brine spring, at which the traders used to make
salt. The spring is about thirty feet in diameter, the water is blue, and, with the longest poles, no bottom can be found. It is near the bank of the Elk River, between the Assinneboin and Sas-kow-ja-wun, about twenty days’journey from the trading-house at Lake Winnipeg. There are, in that part of the country, many brine springs and salt lakes, but I have seen no other as large as this.