land of the Peninsula in a direction roughly parallel to the Gulf coast. The table-land is 2,240 feet above the ocean at the sources of the east branch of the Moisic. It is preeminently sterile, and where the country is not burned, cariboo moss covers the rocks, with stunted spruce, birch and aspen in the hollows and deep ravines. The whole of the table-land is strewed with an infinite number of boulders, sometimes three and four deep; these singular erratices are perched on the summit of every mountain and hill, often on the edges of cliffs, and they vary in size from one foot to twenty feet in diameter. Language fails to paint the awful desolation of the table-land of the Labrador Peninsula.*

INDIAN SALMON-SPEARING IN LABRADOR.

All tribes of Indians from the Red River of the North to the Atlantic coast of Labrador, draw a considerable share of their support from the lakes and rivers, by means of the fish-spear or "negog" of the Montagnais of the Gulf of St. Lawrence. But spearing any kind of fish during the daytime is a tame and monotonous occupation compared with the irrepressible excitement which attends spearing salmon by torch-light, with Indians who understand their work. It unfolds the real character of the Indian race in its most striking peculiarities; it displays untutored man in the full strength of his natural gifts, expresses his capabilities for intense enjoyment, and shows how he may be roused to exert for hours together the utmost activity of body and the greatest presence of mind.

See how gently they step into their canoe in the gloom of the evening just passing into night. They whisper to one another, although there is no fear of the sound of their Voices disturbing the prey of which they are in search.

* See "Explorations in the Interior of the Labrador Peninsula" by the author of this article.

Watch the one in the bow trying the flexible clasping tines of his "negog" or salmon-spear, springing them backward to see if they have lost their elasticity, or if they can be trusted to hold a powerful fish in their grasp; how he straightens the long and slender shaft and lays it tenderly under the bars of the canoe within reach of his hand. He next examines the rolls of birch-bark which he will use for torches, and fastens a cleft stick to the bow of his canoe, in which he will insert one extremity of the flaming roll. Turning round to ask his companion if he has "fire," he receives a low grunt in reply, which is followed by a subdued howh! howh! and both grasping their paddles, away the canoe glides towards the foot of the rapids, to a well known shallow, or close to the tumbling waters of a cataract where the fish are known to lie.

The torch is lit, and the spearman relinquishing his paddle stands in the bow of the canoe, glancing eagerly from side to side. Suddenly he pushes his spear in a slanting direction, and quickly draws it back, lifting a salmon into the canoe; a second push and another victim; now he attaches a thin line of sinew to his spear and twines it round his arm. Like an arrow he darts his spear; it is whirled away with a sudden jerk, and trembles in the stream; he gently but steadily draws it towards him with the line of sinew, and grasping it when within reach, lifts his quarry into the canoe. Look over the side of the little craft, the salmon are seen coming to the light, they gaze for a moment and glide away like spectres into the black waters; some of them swim round the canoe, and come to look again and again, pausing but for a moment to speculate upon its brightness, and the next lie quivering at the bottom of the

canoe.

Both Indians at the same moment see a fish of unusual size approach the light, gaze without stopping and quickly move off, hover about at some little distance, suspicious

and distrustful, but still attracted by the light. Gently and noiselessly the canoe is urged toward him by the Indian in the stern, no words pass between him and his companion, both saw the fish at the same moment and both know that they will take him. But look at the Indian with the spear, look at his face illumined by the red flare of the burning torch; his mouth is half open with suspense, but he does not breathe through it, his dilated eyes are flashing intent, he stands so motionless, with uplifted spear ready to strike, that he looks like a statue of bronze. But there is life in that expanding and contracting nostril, life in the two thin streams of vapo which puff from his nostrils into the keen night air; and is there not sudden and vigorous life in that swift dart of the spear, those parting lips closing together in unison with the fling of his arm? is there not intelligent life in that momentary light which flashes from his eyes, red like the gleams which they reflect, and in that smile, triumphant and assured, which he throws at his companion, as, without uttering a word or sound, he lifts with both hands the heavy fish straight from the water, holds it struggling over the canoe, and shakes it from his spear? Is this the languid, drowsy savage which you have often seen slouching through the day, indolent and listless, a sluggard and a drone?

They go to the foot of the cataract; the largest fish lie there in little eddies close to the rocks, waiting for an opportunity to take their leap up the tumbling waters, to sheltered parts above, where they may rest in their difficult ascent. Now is the full measure of the Indian's skill required; the broken water at the edge of the main rapid at the foot of the cataract rocks the canoe, and would seem to destroy the spearer's aim; the water is deep, and he must throw his weapon, he cannot push it as in the shallows or a quiet stream. The Indian who is steering and paddling must beware of strong eddies, of whirlpools, of getting

under the cataract, or of sidling into the rapid below. He must have his eye on the canoe, the water, and the salmon, and his hand ready at any moment to edge off from danger and never give way to momentary excitement, even when the spear is thrown, and a heavy fish struck,-the rocks, the impetuous torrent, the tumbling waters at his bow, the flickering light not always to be relied on, must be watched, for a slight change in an eddy may swamp the fragile craft, or break it on a rock.

There is indescribable excitement in the dancing motion at the foot of a cataract, in a tiny birch-bark canoe, by the red light of a torch during a night without a moon. You see before you a wall of water, red, green and white tumbling incessantly at your feet, on either hand you gaze on a wall of rock, rising so high as to be lost in the gloom and apparently blending with the sky. You look behind and there is a foaming torrent rushing into the blackness of night, sweeping past the eddy in which your birch craft is lightly dancing to the loud music of a water-fall. No sound but its never-ceasing din can reach you; no near object meets your eye which does not reflect a red glare and assume an unaccustomed character which the warm and cheery color imparts. Suddenly the torch falls and is instantly extinguished in the rushing waters; absolute darkness envelopes you, the white foam, the changing green of the falling water, the red reflected light of the broken waves, all become uniformly and absolutely black. Nothing whatever is discernible to the eye, but perhaps another sense tells of swift undulating motion, a rolling ride over stormy waves, with lessening roar. Your eyes gradually recover their power of vision, and you find yourself either swaying up and down in the same eddy or far away from the fall on the main channel of the river, secure against whirlpools and rocks, with the Indians quietly paddling the canoe and about to turn again to resume their savage sport. The

moment the light fell into the water, an event which often occurs with birch-bark torches, the Indian at the stern decided whether to remain in the eddy, or to enter the rapid and descend it until his power of vision was restored. This is a contingency for which all salmon-spearers in such situations must be prepared. Indecision might prove fatal; for if the eddy were safe in absolute darkness for a quarter of a minute, it would be wise to remain; if there is danger of being sucked under the fall, it would be well to seek refuge from a sudden deluge, or from rocks and whirlpools in the swift but tumultuous rapid. This can only occur on a large river, and at the foot of a fall. Water in rapid motion is a terrible power, and none know how to take advantage of its humors better than the wild Indian salmonspearer, who avoids its dangers with matchless skill and self-possession, and who seeks, the excitement it offers as if it were the mainspring of his life, or the aim of his existence.

LIFE IN THE WILDERNESS.

From the earliest period when the fur trade was prosecuted with vigor in British America, those wanderers through the woods, the Coureurs du Bois, with their descendants, the Bois brules, or Half-breeds, have always occupied a prominent position on the frontiers of civilization, and latterly among many of the nomadic Indian tribes which peopled and still occupy the vast north-west territory. Life in the wilderness has not only peculiar charms to these children of the forest and the prairies, but it annually wins for months or for years many who have been brought up and educated in all the refinements of civilized society. It is difficult to say wherein lies the greatest charm of the wilderness of British America, within the limits of the valley of the St. Lawrence, or the valley of the Saskatchewan. Rocks, mountains, foaming torrents, magnificent cataracts,