THE FUR TRADERS

Dominion, Volume 11, Issue 199, 11 May 1918, Page 9

THE FUR TRADERS

CANADA'S WILD HINTERLAND WHERE THE WORLD'S ADVENTURERS ROAM (By A. W. Packard.) Long after tho last chapter in tho present great war conies to be written those ;wno worship bt tho shrine of the twin •* gods Chanco and Adventure need not mako their supplications in vain. Unrelenting warfare must continue to bo waged with Canada's frozen nor'-west for a generation or so beforo it is coerced into bowing the knee to civilisation. Into the avaricious maw oil the North King still must there be poured much of tho priceless red blood which pulsntes through tho veins of tho Anglo-Saxon frontierstann; and then, and not till then, will P 1 0! y's er wll ° onco -amented that science had killed adventure bo quoting more than a half-truth. From, suv, the fifty-third degree right clear north to the Pole is ono huge tract. Some of it is barren, but much of it has unrivalled resouices from the point of view of tho big gamo hunter, the trapper, tho prospector, and the nature lover. Over this vast "No Man's '■ .Land tho frontiersman may roam at ; wjl, and mingle his derisive 'laughter , with that of tho North King.at society ! and civilisation. Two million square j miles, moro than half the acreage of Canada, that is what the unorganised tor-1 ritones of the snow dominion comprise, ] and all these aro given over to sonio 60,000 inhabitants. These figures are still more significant when it is borne in mind that in the West much of the balance, the organised territory, which includes I tho provinces of Saskatchewan, Alberta, j and _ British Columbia, is still in ita ! virgin state. And the whole of New Zea- j land is made up of one"iiuiidred thousand square miles!

Tho Land of Fur. For decades the North-West has exported furs. It has generally been asso. elated in the public mind as a land of t'ur. It was so as far back as 1870, n-hen Charles II panted a charter to Priuco lluport and seventeen other noblemen pua gentlemen who were incorporated as "Ye Anciente and Honourable Companie of Gentlemen Adventurers of England, trading into Hudson Bay." Their first settlements were made on Jamos Bay and at Churchill and Hayes Rivers. Their losses were at first imnieuso, and it was long before they ventured into the interior, which is now the main source of the supply of furs. At first tho company had an absolute monopoly of all trading, but in the nineteenth century the territory was thrown open to all. To-day the company, and thoir latter-day, rivals, the Bevillon Ereres, have many trading posts, nnd far on the frontier hurled tho fur traders ply their calling to-day J mid surroundings which for centuries ihave remained unchanged, For, excepting the . fact that hostile Indians no longer harass the trappers, the undertaking is btill hazardous aud tho country is .'till unexploited and to a large extent unexplored. The furs are many in variety, and include fox, mink, weasel, lyns, otter, beaver, bear, musk*at, and tho skins of many other' deni- ! Bens of tho north. Tho finest furs are ob- J tainablo from the Arctic and northern Yegious, for the lower the latitude tho less full and silky the fur. In addition to Indians and half-breeds, descended i i'rom the original French stock, mauy ,white men live Boiely by trapping, and make good catches. Many of them never teee civilisation, and they live the Eamo free, wild natural life as their forbears did in the days when Wolf's army was assailing the Heights of Quebec. They market their furs atthß trading pests, which aro' situated far in ad ranee of civilised parts, and they paok their supplies in from tho posts. Their requirements aro mainly tea and coffee and tobacco and ammunition, etc., for they depend upon their skill iu.-hunting for food and to a certain extent for their clothes. Tho hido of the moose is most favoured for the hunter's garments, for St is said that this animal is impc-mous to cold, and what is good for the niooso is good for- men. Trappers hold that whon the glass falls below 86 no animal can live save the moose. That is why in winters of unusual severity caribou, wolves, and other wild animals drift south.

The Battle of the Strong. _ The fur industry, like other frontier industries, ever recedes with the advance of civilisation. Nevertheless, there are over a million square miles in Canada which for generations and generations to pome will te tho happy Hunting ground of the fur traders. From the very fact that the greater part of it will never yield much oUo on a commercial scale but fiU3 will.this territory bo preserved to nature. No ?rcat fortunes- are amassed by the trappers. The cream of the industry is skimmed by the fur-trading companies. The life of the trapper is often a continual round of hardship, especially in the_ winter. Many weary hours aro spent in sotting baits, traps, and wires, and frequently whon the hunter retraces his' steps to collect his quarry it is only to find it gone, devoured, by some larger animal which has visited the traps before him.

Imbued with a spirit of adventure, and impressed with the fact that the whole north is overrun with fur-bearing animal?, many of civilisation's younger sons sometimes go to Canada and rush straight for the frontier. They see fortunes in furs within easy range of their activities,

whereas many experienced trappers Lave I worked at Iho game for years and never earned more than a livelihood. Theso excursions on the part of young "hotheads" from civilised parts were noticeable! hofore tbo war, and many of them ended disastrously. The business oi a trapper calls for high degree of skili which is bom of long experience Many of tho animals nro extraordinarily crafty, and iho fur-traders havo to match their forest-craft and cunning with that, of their quarry. When a new man goos j forth into tho wilderness ho has to figure out how he is going to live if furs do not conio his way in payable quantities. ' The newcomer will require au Indian guide and an outfit of .stores and equip- ■ merit, and all this takes money, lie j may lose tho whole outfit hundreds of : miles from a post, .whilo making tho . portage on the rapids w" some swift-flow- .' ing river. In this caso his guitlo will, after the habit of his ilk, more than ■ likely desert his master, unless tho latter has much more to offer in cash and ■ in kind, and, lacking tho necessary ex-; perience, tho young nimrod will be left j on his uppers. i ' The Old Dog For the Hard Road, j 'ihe modus operandi recommended to j a young man who wanta to go trapping I and make a living at it is to go as part- ■ nor to sumo old liand at the game, and ' not to have any dealings witli tho Indians. It would be better still foi| tho newcomer to tako up a free Dominion Government homestead in that part of '■ tho snrveyed country bordering on tho j frontier in any of tho three westorn provinces. That done, iet him work at j

that during the'summer and get accu. tomed to tho ways of the country an the habits of tho animal kingdom. In the fall, when there is nothing doing on his homestead, lie could cross over into the fur, belt, and there build his iosr cabin and size up the lay of the land. Then, with the advent of tho "freezeup," he will he fortified against tho snow find the cold. When spring comes around the country will be again open for trailing, and if he is wiso lie will store his traps and gear, board up Ills cabin, and return to his homestead and work on his land till tho next winter; for the best fur is obtained by killing the animals \\;heu thu winter is at its height, as tho colder the season tho better the colour and quality of the fur.

A Hunter's Paradise. The whole territory is alive with game, and in many districts are to bo found boar, wolf, beaver, otter, moose, and deer of several other species. The Eockics are full of caribou, moose, and bear. Big game also abounds thousands of miles east of this great divide in New Ontario,- Northern Manitoba, and, somewhat closer, in Northern Saskatchewan and Northern Alberta. Then take the Yukon. At stated reasons immense herds of deer, principally caribou, traverse the -wilderness. Only last winter from Dawson City, Yukon territory, the migration, to warmer dimes was reported of a vast hord of millions of caribou | from the barren lands. For days and i days this four-footed army passed in endless review. Drivon south by instinctive knowledge of the Coming of an unusually savere winter in Iho farthest north, the cavalcade pushed on—night and dcy—in narrow column. Old-timers could not recall a migration of _ such magnitude, so it does not look as if tho north is in danger of becoming played out as the stamping ground for big gama. On the prairies nto immensequantities of prairie-chickens, and grouse are plentiful nil over tho country. Fish abound. Enormous quantities of plko and pickerel are found m most of the lakes, and in the rivers of lower Mackenzie and in British Columbia salmon ore v.ry plentiful. Brides these fish there are in Various localities white fish, trout of all kinds, and in the norths'"! parts the scaled Arctic trout, ling, and grayling. Wild ducks are present in millions, as are also wild geeso and otlwr waterfowl. Verily it is an angler's paradise, unequalled" in any other part of the world.

Wolves. Wolfskins mnkb excellent rugs, but notwithstanding this wolves nro not popular, and nobody would bo sorry to see the last of thorn in Canada. Timber wolves and grey wolves, which are tho most dreaded of the wolr tribe, nro every now mid again driven far south during unusually .cold winters. Wolves nro a pest, and in some districts a danger. In eonsei quence, in somo districts there is a, substantia! bounty put on their bends. In the l'6aco River country in the Inst season, in which tho wolves were plentiful, over two hundred horses were killed by them in one district, in the country contiguous to Fort St. John. Hundreds of miles south-east of this, in the prairie country, on the Big Muddy River, along the American border, timber wolves last winter accounted for many ranch cattle. There are three'species of wolves in North America, the timber, the grey, and the prairio wolf. The prairie wolf is a small wolf, harmless to humans, and it over-runs all the prairies. Ho is an inveterate sheep-killer. The limber wolf is of largo and very powerful build, and, like the grey wolf (a denizen of the barren lands), he has the same fierceness as Ms Siberian cousins. They do not hunt men in country which is at all settled, for there cattle, horses, and other domestic animals provide all they desire in the matter of food. TJp'in the wilderness and in the frozen, open spaces it is sometimes a different story during' periods of severe cold and shortage 01 food. There the wolves are in their own country, and they regulate their morals accordingly.