The Walrus Hunters, Robert Michael Ballantyne [new reading .TXT] 📗

brought them to a point full half-way up the rapid. But now greater caution was needed, because anything like a miss would send them downward, and might hurl them with destructive force against the rocks and ledges which they had already passed. A birch-bark canoe is an exceedingly tender craft, which is not only certain of destruction if it strikes a rock, but is pretty sure of being swamped if it even grazes one.

With the utmost care, therefore, and consummate skill, they succeeded in pushing up the rapid, inch by inch, without mishap, until they reached the last shoot, when their skill or good fortune, or whatever it was, failed them, for they missed the last eddy, were swept downwards a few yards, and just touched a rock. It was a very slight touch. A boatman would have smiled at it; nevertheless it drew from the Indians "ho's!" and "hoi's!" such as they had not given vent to since the voyage began. At the same time they rushed the canoe, with all their strength, for the nearest point of land.

They were scarcely a minute in reaching it, yet in that brief space of time their craft had almost sunk, a large piece of the bark having been torn from its side.

The instant they touched land the two leaders stepped quickly out, and, while they held the craft close to the bank, their comrades threw out the bundles of fur as fast as possible. Then the canoe was turned over to empty it, and carried up the bank.

"That is good luck," said Mozwa quietly, as they stood looking at the large hole in the canoe.

"I have seen better luck," remarked Nazinred, with something that might almost have been mistaken for a smile on his grave countenance.

Mozwa did not explain. Nazinred knew that the luck referred to was the fact that before the accident occurred they had surmounted all the difficulties of the rapid, and that the place on which they stood was convenient for camping on, as well as for opening out and drying the furs on the following day. And Mozwa knew that Nazinred knew all that.

While the latter kindled a fire, arranged the camp, and prepared supper under a spreading tree, the former mended the canoe. The process was simple, and soon completed. From a roll of birch-bark, always carried in canoes for such emergencies, Mozwa cut off a piece a little larger than the hole it was designed to patch. With this he covered the injured place, and sewed it to the canoe, using an awl as a needle and the split roots of a tree as thread. Thereafter he plastered the seams over with gum to make them water-tight, and the whole job was finished by the time the other men had got supper ready.

Indians are in the habit of eating supper in what may be styled a business-like manner--they "mean business," to use a familiar phrase, when they sit down to that meal. Indeed, most savages do; it is only civilised dyspeptics who don't. When the seriousness of the business began to wear off, the idea of mental effort and lingual communication occurred to the friends. Hitherto their eyes alone had spoken, and these expressive orbs had testified, as plainly as could the tongue, to the intense gratification they derived from the possession of good appetites and plenty of food.

"I think," said Mozwa, wiping his mouth with that familiar handkerchief--the back of his hand--"that there will be trouble in the camp before long, for when you are away that beast Magadar has too much power. He will try to make our young men go with him to fight the Eskimos!"

It must not be supposed that the Indian applied the word "beast" to Magadar in that objectionable and slangy way in which it is used among ourselves. Indians happily have no slang. They are not civilised enough for that. Mozwa merely meant to express his opinion that Magadar's nature was more allied to that of the lower than of the higher animals.

"Yes, and Alizay will encourage him," returned Nazinred, with a frown. "The man is well-named."

This remark about the name had reference to the word Alizay, which means gunpowder, and which had been given to the Indian in his boyhood because of his fiery and quarrelsome disposition.

"The geese and the ducks are in plenty just now," continued Nazinred; "I hope that he and Magadar will be more taken up with filling their mouths than fighting till I return--and then I can hinder them."

"H'm!" responded Mozwa. He might have said more, but was busy lighting his pipe at the moment. Nazinred made no further remark at the time, for he was in the full enjoyment of the first voluminous exhalation of the weed.

After a few minutes the chief resumed--

"Our old chief is full of the right spirit. He is losing power with the young men, but I think he can still guide them. I will hope so, and we will return as soon as we can."

Poor Nazinred! If he had known that his only and beloved daughter, even while he spoke, was on her way to the mysterious icy sea in company with one of the despised Eskimos--driven away by the violence of the fire-eaters of the camp--he would not have smoked or spoken so calmly. But, fortunately for his own peace of mind, he did not know--he did not dream of the possibility of such a catastrophe; and even if he had known and returned home at full speed, he would have been too late to prevent the evil.

For a long time these Indians lay side by side on their outspread blankets, with their feet to the fire, gazing through the branches at the stars, and puffing away in profound silence, but probably deep thought. At least a sudden exclamation by Mozwa warrants that conclusion.

"You think," he said, "that our old chief has the right spirit. How do you know what is the right spirit? Alizay and Magadar, and many of our braves--especially the young ones--think that a fiery spirit, that flares up like powder, and is always ready to fight, is the right one. You and our old chief think that gentleness and forbearance and unwillingness to fight till you cannot help it is the right spirit. How do you know which is right? You and the war-lovers cannot both be right!"

There was an expression of great perplexity on the Indian's face as he uttered the last sentence.

"My son," replied Nazinred, who, although not much older than his companion, assumed the parental _role_ in virtue of his chieftainship, "how do you know that you are alive?"

This was such an unexpected answer that Mozwa gazed fixedly upwards for a few minutes without making any reply.

"I know it," he said at length, "because I--I--know it. I--I _feel_ it."

"How do you know," continued the chief, with perplexing pertinacity, "that the sun is not the moon?"

Again Mozwa became astronomically meditative. "Because I see it and feel it," he replied. "The sun is brighter and warmer. It cheers me more than the moon, and gives me more light, and warms me. It warms the bushes and flowers too, and makes them grow, and it draws the beasts out of their holes. Even a rabbit knows the difference between the sun and the moon."

"My son," returned Nazinred, "I have not lived very long yet, but I have lived long enough to see, and feel, and know that the kind spirit is the right spirit, because it warms the heart, and opens the eyes, and gives light, and it is the only spirit that can make friends of foes. Is it not better to live at peace and in good-will with all men than to live as enemies?"

"Ho!" responded Mozwa, by way of assent.

"Then the peaceful spirit is the right one," rejoined the chief, with a long-drawn sigh that indicated a tendency to close the discussion.

As Mozwa felt himself to be in a somewhat confused mental condition, he echoed the sigh, laid down his pipe, drew his blanket round him, and, without the formality of "Good-night," resigned himself to repose.

Nazinred, after taking a look at the weather, pondering, perchance, on the probabilities of the morrow, and throwing a fresh log on the fire, also wrapped his blanket round him and lost himself in slumber.


CHAPTER FIFTEEN.


WILD DOINGS OF THE FUR-TRADERS AND RED MEN.

In course of time, after many a hard struggle with rushing rapids and not a few narrow escapes from dangerous rocks, the Indian voyagers swept out at last upon the broad bosom of Great Bear Lake.

This mighty inland sea of fresh water--about two hundred miles in diameter, and big enough to engulf the greater part of Scotland--was, at the time we write of, and still is, far beyond the outmost verge of civilisation, in the remotest solitudes of the Great Lone Land.

Here the fur-traders had established a small trading-post close to the shores of the lake. It was in charge of a Scotchman--we had almost said of course; for it would seem as if these hardy dwellers in the north of our island have a special gift for penetrating into and inhabiting the wildest and most unlikely parts of the world. His name was MacSweenie, and he had a few Orkney-men and half-castes to keep him company while vegetating there.

It was a sort of event, a mild excitement, a pink--if not a red--letter day, when our Indians arrived at that lonely outpost, and MacSweenie, who was in the prime of life and the depths of _ennui_, gave the strangers a hearty and warm reception.

Nazinred had been there before, and was able somewhat to subdue his feelings of admiration and not-quite-exhausted surprise at all the wonderful things he saw; but to the others it was comparatively new, and Mozwa had never been at a trading-post in his life. Being a sympathetic man, he found it difficult to retain at all times that solemnity of manner and look which he knew was expected of him. The chief, who was also sympathetic, experienced deep pleasure in watching his companion's face, and observing the efforts he made to appear indifferent, knowing, as he did, from former experience, that he must in reality be full of surprise and curiosity.

And, truly, in the store of the fur-traders there was a display of wealth which, to unaccustomed Indian eyes, must have seemed almost fabulous. For were there not in this enchanted castle bales of bright blue cloth, and bright scarlet cloth, and various other kinds of cloth sufficient to clothe the entire Dogrib nation? Were there not guns enough--cheap flint-lock, blue-barrelled ones--to make all the Eskimos in the polar regions look blue with envy, if not with fear? Were there not bright beads and brass rings, and other baubles, and coloured silk thread, enough to make the hearts of all the Dogrib squaws to dance with joy? Were there not axes, and tomahawks, and scalping-knives enough to make the fingers of the braves to itch for war? Were there not hooks and lines enough to capture all the fish in Great Bear Lake, and "nests" of copper kettles enough to boil them all at one tremendous culinary operation? And was there not gunpowder enough to