ans ranged in semicircles before him, seated on the ground,
and silently smoking their pipes. Speeches would be made, presents
exchanged, and the audience would break up in universal good humor.

Now would ensue a brisk traffic with the merchants, and all Montreal
would be alive with naked Indians running from shop to shop, bargaining
for arms, kettles, knives, axes, blankets, bright-colored cloths, and
other articles of use or fancy; upon all which, says an old French
writer, the merchants were sure to clear at least two hundred per cent.
There was no money used in this traffic, and, after a time, all payment
in spirituous liquors was prohibited, in consequence of the frantic and
frightful excesses and bloody brawls which they were apt to occasion.

Their wants and caprices being supplied, they would take leave of the
governor, strike their tents, launch their canoes, and ply their way up
the Ottawa to the lakes.

A new and anomalous class of men gradually grew out of this trade. These
were called coureurs des bois, rangers of the woods; originally men
who had accompanied the Indians in their hunting expeditions, and made
themselves acquainted with remote tracts and tribes; and who now became,
as it were, peddlers of the wilderness. These men would set out from
Montreal with canoes well stocked with goods, with arms and ammunition,
and would make their way up the mazy and wandering rivers that interlace
the vast forests of the Canadas, coasting the most remote lakes, and
creating new wants and habitudes among the natives. Sometimes they
sojourned for months among them, assimilating to their tastes and habits
with the happy facility of Frenchmen, adopting in some degree the Indian
dress, and not unfrequently taking to themselves Indian wives.

Twelve, fifteen, eighteen months would often elapse without any tidings
of them, when they would come sweeping their way down the Ottawa in full
glee, their canoes laden down with packs of beaver skins. Now came their
turn for revelry and extravagance. "You would be amazed," says an old
writer already quoted, "if you saw how lewd these peddlers are when they
return; how they feast and game, and how prodigal they are, not only in
their clothes, but upon their sweethearts. Such of them as are married
have the wisdom to retire to their own houses; but the bachelors act
just as an East Indiaman and pirates are wont to do; for they lavish,
eat, drink, and play all away as long as the