s
144 JOURNAL OF A VO YAGE THROUGH THE
»793* this day*one of my men, who had been fome time with the Indians, came
Fatality. 3 ’
to inform me that one of them had threatened to ftab him 5 and on his preferring
a complaint to the man with whom he now lived, and to whom
I had given him in charge, he replied* that he had been very imprudent
to play and quarrel with the young Indians out of his lodge, where
no one would dare to come and quarrel with him; but that ifhe,had
loft his life where he had been, it would have been the cbrifequfence' of
hts own fdly. Thus, even among thefe children of nature, it appears
that a man’s houfe is his caftle, where the protection of hbfpitality is
rigidly maintained.
The hard froft which had prevailed from the beginning of February
continued to the 16th o f March, when the wind blowing from the! South-
Weft, the weather became mild.
On the 2 ad a wolf was fo bold as to venture among the Indian
lodges, and was very near carrying off a child*
I had another obfervation of Jupiter and his latellites for the longitude,
On the 13th fome geefe were feen, and there binds are always con-
fidered as the harbingers of fpring. On the ill o f April my hunters {hot
five o f them, This was a much earlier period than I ever remember to
have obferved the vifits o f wild fowl in this part o f the world. The
weather had been mild for the laft fortnight, and there was a promtfe of
its continuance. On the 5th the fnow had entirely difappeared.
At half paft four this morning I was awakened to be informed that
an Indian had been killed. I accordingly haftened to the camp, where
I found
NORTH-WEST CONTINENT OF AMERICA.
1' found'tw'o* women' employed in rolling up the dead body of a man,
called the/White Paitridgc, in a beaver robe, which I had lent him. He
had received four mortal wounds from a dagger, two within the collarbone,
one in the left bread:, and another in the fmall of the back, with two
cuts acrbis his head. The muidbrerj w fe hadbeen ray "hunter through-
feutr thb winter, had SM? 'and it/was pretended ifcatsfeveral relations
o f the deeeafed wfei#|rbnu in purfmit of him. The hiftory o f this unfortunate
evint is aS* follows:—<
2 Thefe two men had been comrades for four years; the murderer had
three wives; and the young man who was killed, becoming enamoured
©f one; o f th&n, the hufband with the
»feMwed power Of claiming her as hit property, when & fttbuld be his
pltafsrt. This connexion was uninterrupted for near three yearn, When,
wMmfteal as it may appear, the hulband became Jealous, and the public
bttiOOr was ftffpended. The parties, however, made their private affigi*
nations, which cauled the woman to beTo ill treated by her hufband, that
the paramour was determinsdi to take her away and this projeQ;
ended in his ’death. This is a very common praftiCe among the Indians,
anigeberatlyWihinates in Very ferious and fatal quarrels. In confequence
M thil event all the Indies went away in great apparent harry and con-
ftjfion, and in t te eveking n oton eo f them was to be feen about- the fort.
fe The Beaver and Rocky Mountain Indians, who traded with us in this
-Aver, did nbt exceed an hundred and fifty men, capable of bearing
arms; two thirds of whom call themfelves Beaver. Indians. The latter
differ only from the. former, as they have, more or lefs, imbibed the cuf-
XJ * tqms