A Woman's Way Through Unknown Labrador Part 10

CHAPTER XIII

ACROSS THE DIVIDE

The gale continued all night with pa.s.sing showers, which threatened to riddle the tent with their force, and it was not till ten the following forenoon that we were able to proceed, hugging the sh.o.r.e as we went. Deer were about in all directions, and as we rounded a point near the head of the lake, George, standing in the bow of the canoe, and looking across to the woods beyond the big marsh, which stretched away northward, said: "The wood over there is just moving with them."

Camp was pitched on the point among the spruce and tamarack, preparatory to scouting for George River waters, and lunch over, Job and Joe were off to the task, while George and Gilbert built a stage and put the caribou meat over the fire to smoke and dry again. It was my golden opportunity to air my camp stuff, and bags were emptied and everything spread out in the sunshine and wind.

Later my washing, neglected on Sunday on account of the storm, was added to the decorations.

How very much I wanted to go scouting with Job and Joe! Here I expected difficulties in finding the way. The map I carried indicated a number of detached lakes stretching miles northward from Lake Michikamats, and to find among the lakes of this upper plain the one which should prove the source of the George River, promised to be interesting work. Inwardly impatient I waited for the return of the men. Less than two hours later I saw them come down across the marsh to where they had left the canoe. There mounting a huge boulder they sat down to watch the caribou.

This was trying, when I had so eagerly waited for the news they were to bring; but a little reflection convinced me that it meant simply--nothing definite about the George River. Otherwise they would have come immediately to camp. The conclusion proved correct, and when towards evening they came in, the report was-- more streams and lakes leading northward up the slope of the plateau. We had not yet reached the real head of the Nascaupee River.

Thursday morning, August 10th, we began our portage across the marsh. Before leaving, the men had a few careless, ineffectual shots at a crow which had alighted near the camp, the first of its kind we had seen on the trip. The marsh was one mile wide from east to west, and reached almost two miles northward from the upper end of the lake. It was cut by many little streams, which, issuing from a tiny lake one mile and a half above camp, wound about among the gra.s.sy hummocks of the marsh, collecting half a mile below in a small pond, to break again into innumerable tiny channels leading down to Lake Michikamats.

The pond and streams above gave us some paddling. Then came more portaging to the little lake. Below it lay a stretch of higher ground which was a queer sort of collection of moss-covered hummocks, crisscrossed by caribou trails cut deep into the soft soil. Here cloudberries grew in abundance, and though not yet ripe, they were mature enough to taste almost as good as the green apples I used to indulge in surrept.i.tiously in the days of my youth. They seemed a great treat now, for they were the first fruit found in abundance on the trip, though we had seen a few that were nearly ripe on an island in Lake Michikamau, and on the 8th of August Gilbert had gathered a handful of ripe blueberries on Caribou Hill.

The lake was about one mile long and two hundred yards wide, and was fed by a good-sized stream coming down from the north in continuous rapids. The stream was deep, and the canoes were poled up with all the outfit in them to the lake above, and on a great bed of huge, packed boulders at the side of the stream we halted for lunch. The quest was becoming more and more interesting. When was our climbing to end? When were we really going to find the headwaters of the Nascaupee, and stand at the summit of the plateau? It was thoroughly exciting work this climbing to the top of things.

That afternoon our journey carried us northwest through beautiful Lake Adelaide, where long wooded points and islands cutting off the view ahead, kept me in a constant state of suspense as to what was to come next. About 4 P.M. we reached the northern extremity of the lake, where the way seemed closed; but a little searching discovered a tiny stream coming in from the north and west of this the well marked Indian trail. What a glad and rea.s.suring discovery it was, for it meant that we were on the Indian highway from Lake Michikamau to George River. Perhaps our task would not be so difficult after all.

The portage led north one hundred yards to a little lake one mile long and less than one quarter wide, and here we found ourselves at the very head of the Nascaupee River. There was no inlet to the lake, and north of it lay a bog two hundred yards wide which I knew must be the Height of Land, for beyond it stretched a body of water which had none of the appearance of a still water lake, and I felt sure we should find its waters flowing north.

It was just 5 P.M. when, three hundred miles of my journey into the great, silent wilderness pa.s.sed, I stepped out of the canoe to stand at last on the summit of the Divide--the first of the white race to trace the Nascaupee River to its source.

I had a strange feeling of being at the summit of the world. The country was flat and very spa.r.s.ely wooded, but I could not see far.

It seemed to fall away on every hand, but especially to north and south. The line of the horizon was unnaturally near, and there was more than the usual realising sense of the great s.p.a.ce between the earth and the sky. This was enhanced by the lifting of a far distant hill-top above the line as if in an attempt to look across the Divide.

That morning I had found myself with only a few films left, for the fascination of taking the first photographs of the region traversed had betrayed me into using my material more lavishly than I should; but now I squandered two films in celebration of the achievement, taking one picture looking out over the waters flowing South to Lake Melville and the Atlantic and facing about, but without otherwise changing my position, one over the waters which I felt sure we should find flowing north to Ungava Bay.

In a wonderfully short time the outfit had been portaged across, and we were again in the canoes, the quest now being, not for the inlet but for the outlet of the lake, a much less difficult task.

Less than an hour's paddling carried us to the point where the George River, as a tiny stream, steals away from its source in Lake Hubbard, as if trying to hide in its rocky bed among the willows, to grow in force and volume in its three hundred mile journey to Ungava, till at its discharge there it is a great river three miles in width.

Here at its beginning on the boggy margin of the stream we went into camp. Here I saw the sun set and rise again, and as I lay in my tent at dawn, with its wall lifted so that I could look out into the changing red and gold of the eastern sky, I heard a splashing of water near, and looking up saw a little company of caribou cross at the head of the stream and disappear towards the sunrise.

CHAPTER XIV

THROUGH THE LAKES OF THE UPPER GEORGE

How little I had dreamed when setting out on my journey that it would prove beautiful and of such compelling interest as I had found it. I had not thought of interest--except that of getting the work done--nor of beauty. How could Labrador be beautiful?

Weariness and hardship I had looked for, and weariness I had found often and anxiety, which was not yet past in spite of what had been achieved; but of hardship there had been none. Flies and mosquitoes made it uncomfortable sometimes but not to the extent of hardship. And how beautiful it had been, with a strange, wild beauty, the remembrance of which buries itself silently in the deep parts of one's being. In the beginning there had been no response to it in my heart, but gradually in its silent way it had won, and now was like the strength-giving presence of an understanding friend. The long miles which separated me from the world did not make me feel far away--just far enough to be nice--and many times I found myself wishing I need never have to go back again. But the work could not all be done here.

Half the distance across the peninsula had been pa.s.sed, and now on August 11th we were beginning the descent of the George River.

Would the Labrador skies continue to smile kindly upon me? It would be almost if not quite a three hundred mile journey to Ungava, and it might be more. Could we make the post by the last week in August? The men appeared confident; but for me the days which followed held anxious hours, and the nights sleepless ones as I tried to make my decision whether in case it should become evident we could not reach Ungava in time, I should turn back, leaving the work uncompleted, or push on, accepting the consequent long winter journey back across Labrador, or round the coast, and the responsibility of providing for my four guides for perhaps a full year. At least the sun shone on the beginning of the journey, and about nine o'clock, the last pack having gone forward, I set off down the portage below Lake Hubbard, a prayer in my heart that the journey might be swift.

The prayer seemed doomed to remain unanswered at first. Before noon of that day the sun was hidden, and for nearly a week we did not again see his face. Violent storms of wind and rain and snow made progress difficult or impossible, and on August 16th we were camped only thirty miles from the Height of Land.

The upper river proved a succession of lake expansions of varying sizes, their waters dropping from one to the other down shallow rapids. At the Height of Land, and for some miles beyond, the country is flat and boggy, and spa.r.s.ely wooded with tamarack and spruce, many of the tall, slender tops of the former being bent completely over by the storms. The spruce was small and scant, increasing in size and quant.i.ty as we descended from the highest levels, but nowhere on the northern slope attaining the size reached in the valley of the Nascaupee.

Gradually low, barren ridges began to appear, their white mossy sides marked by caribou trails which formed a network over the country we were pa.s.sing through, and all were freshly cut with hoof marks. Every day there were herds or single deer to be seen along the way, and at a number of points we pa.s.sed long piles of whitened antlers. Other game too, ducks, geese, and ptarmigan had become plentiful since we entered the caribou country, and now and then a few were taken to vary the monotony of the diet of dried caribou meat. Loons were about us at all hours, and I grew to love their weird call as much almost as the Indians do.

We travelled too fast to fish, and it was stormy, but the indications were that in places at least fish were abundant. When we ran down to the little lake, on which our camp of August 12th was pitched, hundreds of fish played at its surface, keeping the water in constant commotion. They were in no wise disturbed by our presence and would turn leisurely over within two feet of the canoe. I ran out my troll as we paddled down the lake--but not a nibble did I get. The men said they were white fish.

Every day we expected to see or hear something of the wolves which are said to attend the movements of the caribou; but no sign of them appeared, save the one track found at the point on Lake Michikamats.

Signs of the Indians became more numerous, and on a point near the head of Cabot Lake we found a camp but lately deserted, and left, evidently, with the idea of return in the near future. The Indians had been there all through the spring, and we found a strongly built cache which the men thought probably contained furs, but which we did not, of course, disturb. It was about ten feet long and six feet wide at the base, and built in the form of an A, with the trunks of trees from five to six inches in diameter set up close together and c.h.i.n.ked with moss and boughs.

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 sh.o.r.e 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 sc.r.a.pe 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 impa.s.sable 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.

The talk drifted to stories of the Indians, tributary to Rupert's House, and the practical jokes perpetrated on them while camped about the post to which they brought each spring from the far interior their winter's catch of furs. There were stories of Hannah Bay ma.s.sacre, and the retribution which followed swift and certain; and of their own trips inland, and the hospitality of the Indians. The talk ended with an anxious "If it were only the Hudson Bay Indians we were coming to, there would be no doubt about the welcome we should get."

Turning to me, George remarked, "You are giving that revolver a fine rubbing up to-night."

"Yes," I replied, laughing a little: "I am getting ready for the Nascaupees."

"They would not shoot you," he said gravely. "It would be us they would kill if they took the notion. Whatever their conjurer tells them to do, they will do."

"No," a.s.serted Gilbert, who boasted some traditional knowledge of the Nascaupees, "they would not kill you, Mrs. Hubbard. It would be to keep you at their camp that they would kill us."

I had been laughing at George a little, but Gilbert's startling announcement induced a sudden sobriety. As I glanced from one to the other, the faces of the men were all unwontedly serious. There was a whirl of thoughts for a moment, and then I asked, "What do you think I shall be doing while they are killing you? You do not need to suppose that because I will not kill rabbits, or ptarmigan, or caribou, I should have any objection to killing a Nascaupee Indian if it were necessary."

Nevertheless the meeting with the Indians had for me a.s.sumed a new and more serious aspect, and, remembering their agony of fear lest some harm befall me ere we reached civilisation again, I realised how the situation seemed to the men. When I went to my tent, it was to lie very wide awake, turning over in my mind plans of battle in case the red men proved aggressive.

The following morning the weather was still bad but we attempted to go forward. Soon a snow squall drove us to the shelter of the woods. When it had pa.s.sed we were again on the water; but rain came on and a gale of wind drove it into our faces, till they burned as if hot water instead of cold were pelting them. We could make no headway, and so put ash.o.r.e on the right bank of the river to wait for calmer weather. Camp was made on a tiny moss-covered ridge of rock back of the stretch of swamp along the sh.o.r.e, and soon a roaring fire sent out its welcome warmth to the wet and shivering wayfarers crouching near it in the shelter of the spruce.

How cold it was! And how slowly we were getting on!

The river widened here, and on the left bank, at short intervals broad trails with fresh cut tracks led down to its edge, and along the sh.o.r.e a wide band of white caribou hair clung to the bank four feet above the river, where it had been left by the receding water.

So we knew that the caribou had been in possession of the region since shedding their winter coats.

We had been sitting by the fire only a little while when Job, who, after his usual manner had disappeared, called to us in a low, eager voice from one hundred feet away. He said only one word-- "Joe"--but we all knew what it meant and there was a rush in the direction in which he had again disappeared. A herd of fifteen caribou were swimming across from the opposite sh.o.r.e straight to the little bay above our landing. Under cover of the woods and willows we stole down quite close to the water and waited until they came almost to sh.o.r.e. Then springing from our hiding places we shouted at them. The beautiful, frightened creatures turned and went bounding back through the shallow water, splashing it into clouds of spray, till they sank into the deeper tide and only heads and stubs of tails could be seen as they swam back to the other sh.o.r.e. They were nearly all young ones, some of them little fawns.

All day long, at short intervals, companies of them were seen crossing, some one way, some another. Towards evening two herds pa.s.sed the camp at the same time, one to the east of us but a short distance away, and the other along the foot of the ridge on the west, not fifty feet from our camp.