the east to the Pacific on the west.
Beyond the further shore of Lake Superior is found a region of lakes and
rapid rivers, rocks, hills, and dense wood, extending for about 400
miles, nearly up to the Red River or Selkirk settlement. To the west of
this, a rich prairie stretches far away up to the foot of the Rocky
Mountains, from which the Saskatchewan descends, and, soon becoming a
broad river, flows rapidly on to Lake Winnepeg. Other streams
descending, find their way into the Polar Sea, or Hudson's Bay. On the
west, the Columbia, the Fraser, and others flow, with very eccentric
courses, into the Pacific. Besides this, there are numerous lakes
divided from each other, in many instances, by lofty mountains and thick
forests.

Over the whole of this extensive region the Hudson's Bay Company held,
for many years, undivided sway, and kept in its employment large numbers
of men--voyageurs, or canoe-men, and hunters--both whites of European
descent (chiefly French Canadians), and also half-breeds and Red
Indians. The country was inhabited by several nations of Indians, some
known as Wood Indians, others as Prairie Indians and these again were
divided into tribes or clans, frequently at war with each other; and
these wars were cruel in the extreme, often exterminatory, neither age
nor sex being spared. Their dress was skins, embroidered with beads,
feathers, and porcupine quills. They painted their faces and ornamented
their hair in a fantastic manner. Their weapons were the bow and arrow,
spears, and hatchets. Their canoes were of birch-bark; their
habitations, huts, or wigwams, either of a conical shape, or like a
basin reversed, and formed of buffalo-skins and birch-bark. The Indians
of the prairie possessed horses, and hunted the buffalo. Those of the
woods, having few horses, lived chiefly on deer and smaller game, and
cultivated potatoes and Indian corn. They believed in one Great and
Good Spirit, and in the existence of numerous evil spirits, whom they
feared and endeavoured to propitiate. Missionaries, however, went among
them, and many have been brought out of darkness to a knowledge of the
truth.

Among the most interesting of the tribes in British North America and
the west of the Rocky Mountains are the Cootonais. They are handsome,
above the middle size, and, compared with other tribes, remarkably fair;
in conversation candid, in trade honest, brave in battle, and devotedly
attached to each ot