The man has made the house, from door-step to chimney-top, with his own hands. He admits that he spent $30 on window sashes, planed wood for door and floor, and the necessary nails; but otherwise the whole building has cost him in cash only the twenty-five cents charged by the Government for leave to cut logs in Cutknife Valley. He has brought a year’s rations, besides his eight work oxen and milch cow, so he is well able to wait till the second year for his wheat crop. Madame is packing all the eggs and butter she can gather and make for winter use. Between them they find time to read three weekly papers, one French and two English.
“I suppose you are a bit lonely out here as yet,” I remark.
“Lonely? Oh, dear no!” says our host, pointing to a fiddle on a shelf. “We had a couple of dances this summer in my father’s house, and all the girls came from twenty miles around.” There is quite a colony of these “original Canadians” here already, and not one home without plenty of children.
We ride over to the battlefield in the morning. Twenty years have passed since the Indians caught us on Cutknife Hill, but the grassy slope is still strewn with empty cartridge shells. An old Indian who took his share in the fray goes over the battlefield with us, exchanging reminiscences where once we exchanged hot shot, and “reconstructing” the scene by creeping up the slope with an imaginary gun in his hand. Then the enemies of a bygone day sit down and take pot-luck together—pot-luck being a couple of prairie chicken brought down with one shot.
To-day, it seems, the painted warriors of ’85 are a peaceful community of farmers. Here comes one, driving by in his wagon with a good team of horses. Instead of picturesque blanket and bead-work, he wears what we have the conceit to call civilized clothes, and differs only in complexion from his European neighbors. On the edge of a poplar bluff we meet another Cree brave, who comes forward smiling to have his photograph taken when he has put up his horses in their log stable. His summer dwelling stands close by,—a genuine tepee, but made of canvas instead of buffalo skin—and in front of the door is a wash-tub. Think of it!
Still more remarkable than the wash-tub is the big threshing machine. A little later, and it will be hard at work pouring golden wheat into wagon after wagon. The whole outfit, steam engine and all, was bought by the tribe with their own earnings. The land is still held in common, but any tribesman who wants to fence off part of it as a farm is free to do so.