treasure of food from the Post, did not know that he was poor, or
that through many long years he had been slowly starving. He was rich!
He was a great trapper! And his Cree wife I-owa, with her long, sleek
braid and her great, dark eyes, was tremendously proud of her lord, that
he should bring home for her and the children such a wealth of things--a
little flour, a few cans of things, a few yards of cloth, and a little
bright ribbon. David choked when he ate with them that night. But they
were happy! That, after all, was the reward of things, even though
people died slowly of something which they could not understand. And
there were, in the domain of Father Roland, many Metoosins, and many
I-owas, who prayed for nothing more than enough to eat, clothes to cover
them, and the unbroken love of their firesides. And David thought of
them, as the weeks passed, as the most terribly enslaved of all the
slaves of Civilization--slaves of vain civilized women; for they had
gone on like this for centuries, and would go on for other generations,
giving into the hands of the great Company their life's blood which, in
the end, could be accounted for by a yearly dole of food which, under
stress, did not quite serve to keep body and soul together.

It was after a comprehension of these things that David understood
Father Roland's great work. In this kingdom of his, running
approximately fifty miles in each direction from the Chateau--except to
the northward, where the Post lay--there were two hundred and
forty-seven men, women, and children. In a great book the Little
Missioner had their names, their ages, the blood that was in them, and
where they lived; and by them he was worshipped as no man that ever
lived in that vast country of cities and towns below the Height of Land.
At every tepee and shack they visited there was some token of love
awaiting Father Roland; a rare skin here, a pair of moccasins there, a
pair of snow shoes that it had taken an Indian woman's hands weeks to
make, choice cuts of meat, but mostly--as they travelled along--the
thickly furred skins of animals; and never did they go to a place at
which the Missioner did not leave something in return, usually some
article of clothing so thick and warm that no Indian was rich enough to
buy it for himself at the Post. Twice each winter Father Roland sent
down to Thoreau a great sledge load of these contributions of his
people, and Thoreau, selling them, sent back a stil