Yesterday a Mounted Policeman buried there the body of an Indian man,
his wife and his baby, who fell through the ice in a dog-sled this
spring,--three in one grave, Lamartine's trinity, the Father, the
Mother, and the Child.
It is Sunday, and we have music from a li'l fiddle made by a squaw at
Lac Ste. Anne. Lac la Biche River we pass, and Calling River, and at
five in the evening are at Swift Current, Peachy Pruden's place, and
then Red Mud. Sunday night is clear and beautiful, and we float all
night. Making a pillow of a squat packing-case consigned to the
missionary at Hay River, and idly wondering what it might contain, I
draw up a canvas sheet. But it is too wonderful a night to sleep. Lying
flat upon our backs and looking upward, we gaze at the low heaven full
of stars, big, lustrous, hanging down so low that we can almost reach up
and pluck them. Two feet away, holding in both hands the stern sweep, is
the form of the Cree steersman, his thoughtful face a cameo against the
shadow of the cut-banks. At his feet another half-breed is wrapped in
his blanket, and from here to the bow the boat is strewn with these
human cocoons.
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