We seek for threads which shall
unite this mid-summer day to all the days of glamour that are gone. In a
rambling building, forming the back of a hollow square, we come across
the mouldy remains of a once splendid museum of natural history, the
life work of one Captain Bell of the Old Company. It gives us a sorry
feeling to look at these specimens, now dropping their glass eyes and
exposing their cotton-batting vitals to the careless on-looker, while
the skeleton ribs of that canoe with which Dr. Richardson made history
so long ago add their share to the general desolation. In a journal of
the vintage of 1842 we read an appeal for natural history exhibits sent
to Fort Simpson by an official of the British Museum. He writes,
[Illustration: Hudson's Bay House, Fort Simpson]
"I may observe that in addition to the specimens asked for, any mice,
bats, shrew-mice, moles, lizards, snakes or other small quadrupeds or
reptiles would be acceptable. They may either be skinned or placed in
rum or strong spirits of any kind, a cut being first made in the side of
the body to admit the spirits to the intestines."
Of all the rare humour disclosed in the old records, this entry most
tickles my fancy.
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