of rascality. Had the assassin
succeeded, punishment would have fallen on my Indians.

CHAPTER VII

THE LORDS OF THE NORTH IN COUNCIL

Beyond the Sault, the fascinations of the west beckoned like a siren.
Vast waterways, where a dozen European kingdoms could be dropped into
one lake without raising a sand-bar, seemed to sweep on forever and call
with the voice of enchantress to the very ends of the earth. With the
purple recesses of the shore on one side and the ocean-expanse of Lake
Superior on the other, all the charms of clean, fresh freedom were
unveiling themselves to me and my blood began to quicken with that
fevered delight, which old lands are pleased to call western enthusiasm.
Lake Huron, with its greenish-blue, shallow, placid waters and calm,
sloping shores, seemed typical of the even, easy life I had left in the
east. How those choppy, blustering, little waves resembled the
jealousies and bickerings and bargainings of the east; but when one came
to Lake Superior, with its great ocean billows and slumbering, giant
rocks and cold, dark, fathomless depths, there was a new life in a hard,
rugged, roomy, new world. We hugged close to the north coast; and the
numerous rocky islands to our left stood guard like a wall of adamant
between us and the heavy surf that flung against the barrier. We were
rapidly approaching the headquarters of our company. When south-bound
brigades, with prisoners in hand-cuffs, began to meet us, I judged we
were near the habitation of man.

"Bad men?" I asked Little Fellow, pointing to the prisoners, as our
crews exchanged rousing cheers with the Nor'-Westers now bound for
Montreal.

"_Non, Monsieur!_ Not all bad men," and the Indian gave his shoulders an
expressive shrug, "_Les traitres anglais_."

To the French _voyageur_, English meant the Hudson's Bay people. The
answer set me wondering to what pass things had come between the two
great companies that they were shipping each other's traders
gratuitously out of the country. I recalled the talk at the Quebec Club
about Governor McDonell of the Hudson's Bay trying to expel Nor'-Westers
and concluded our people could play their own game against the commander
of Red River.

We arrived in Fort William at sundown, and a flag was flying above the
courtyard.

"Is that in our honor?" I asked a clerk of the party.

"Not much it is," he laughed. "We under-strappers aren't oppressed with
honors! It warns the Indians there's n