f which the dead
bodies of Indian men, women, and children, lay in every attitude and in
all stages of decomposition. Outside of the tents other corpses lay
strewn on the ground, and most of these bore evidence of having been
more or less torn by wolves. The travellers knew at a glance that these
unfortunate people had fallen before that terrible disease, small-pox,
which had recently attacked and almost depopulated several districts of
the Indian country.

How the disease was introduced among the Indians at the time of which we
write, it is impossible to say and useless to conjecture. The fact of
its desolating effects is unquestionable. One who dwelt in the country
at the time writes: [See Sir Alexander Mackenzie's _Voyages_, page 14.]
"The fatal infection spread around with a baneful rapidity which no
flight could escape, and with a fatal effect that nothing could resist.
It destroyed with its pestilential breath whole families and tribes; and
the horrid scene presented, to those who had the melancholy opportunity
of beholding it, a combination of the dead, the dying, and such as, to
avoid the fate of their friends around them, prepared to disappoint the
plague of its prey by terminating their own existence. To aggravate the
picture, if aggravation were possible, the carcases were dragged forth
from the huts by the wolves, or were mangled within them by the dogs,
which thus sought to satisfy their hunger with the putrid remains of
their masters. It was not uncommon at this time for the father of a
family, whom the infection had not reached, to call his household around
him, represent the terrible sufferings and fate that awaited them, which
he believed was owing to the influence of an evil spirit who desired to
extirpate the race, and incited them to baffle death with all its
horrors by at once killing themselves--at the same time offering to
perform the deed of mercy with his own hand if their hearts should fail
them."

That some of the dead before our pioneers had acted in this way was
evident, for while most of the corpses bore marks of having been smitten
with the disease, others were there which showed nothing to account for
death save a knife wound over the region of the heart.

It was a sad and sickening sight, and drew forth one or two low-toned
sorrowful remarks from Reuben, as he moved slowly towards the tent from
which smoke still issued.

The three men paused before it because a sound came from