There were many of the uncovered wigwams standing about, one a large oblong with three fireplaces in it.  Lying near the wigwams were old clothes of a quite civilised fashion, pots, kettles, a wooden tub, paint-cans and brushes, paddles, a wooden shovel, broken bones, piles of hair from the deer skins they had dressed, and a skin stretcher.  Some steel traps hung in a tree near, and several iron pounders for breaking bones.  On a stage, under two deer-skins, were a little rifle, a shot gun, and a piece of dried deer’s meat.  A long string of the bills of birds taken during the spring, hung on a tree near the water, and besides each of the various wigwams, in the line of them which stretched along the south shore of the point, a whitened bone was set up on a long pole for luck.

The river gradually increased in volume, and all previous excitement of work in the swift water seemed to grow insignificant when my long course in running rapids began.  Perhaps it was because the experience was new, and I did not know what to expect; but as the little canoe careered wildly down the slope from one lake to the next with, in the beginning, many a scrape on the rocks of the river bed, my nervous system contracted steadily till, at the foot where we slipped out into smooth water again, it felt as if dipped into an astringent.

A few miles below Cabot Lake the river is joined by what we judged to be its southeast branch, almost equal to the middle river in size.  This branch, together with a chain of smaller lakes east of Lake Michikamau, once formed the Indian inland route from the Nascaupee River to the George used at times of the year when Lake Michikamau was likely to be impassable on account of the storms.  It had been regularly travelled in the old days when the Indians of the interior traded at Northwest River post; but since the diversion of their trade to the St. Lawrence it had fallen into disuse.

There was much talk of our prospective meeting with the Nascaupees which I did not understand; and it was not until the evening of August 14th, as I sat after supper at the camp fire, that I became conscious of the real concern with which the men were looking forward to the event.

For two precious days we had been unable to move on account of the storms.  The rain had fallen steadily all day, changing to snow towards evening, and now, though the downpour had ceased, the black clouds still fled rolling and tossing over head before the gale, which roared through the spruce forest, and sent the smoke of the big camp fire whirling now this way, now that, as it found its way into our sheltered nook.

George and Joe were telling amusing stories of their boyhood experiences at Rupert’s House, the pranks they played on their teacher, their fights, football, and other games, and while they talked I bestowed some special care upon my revolver.  Job sat smoking his pipe, listening with a merry light in his gleaming, black eyes, and Gilbert lounged on the opposite side of the fire with open-mouthed boyish attention.