their departed relatives.

The almost total absence of religion of any kind among these unhappy
natives is truly melancholy. The very name of our blessed Saviour is
almost unknown by the hundreds of Indians who inhabit the vast forests
of North America. It is strange that, while so many missionaries have
been sent to the southern parts of the earth, so few should have been
sent to the northward. There are not, I believe, more than a dozen or
so of Protestant clergymen over the whole wide northern continent.

For at least a century these North American Indians have hunted for the
white men, and poured annually into Britain a copious stream of wealth.
Surely it is the duty of _Christian_ Britain, in return, to send out
faithful servants of God to preach the gospel of our Lord throughout
their land.

The Indians, after spending a couple of days at the establishment--
during which time they sold me a great many furs--set out again to
return to their distant wigwams. It is strange to contemplate the
precision and certainty with which these men travel towards any part of
the vast wilderness, even where their route lies across numerous
intricate and serpentine rivers. But the strangest thing of all is, the
savage's certainty of finding his way in winter through the trackless
forest, to a place where, perhaps, he never was before, and of which he
has had only a slight description. They have no compasses, but the
means by which they discover the cardinal points is curious. If an
Indian happens to become confused with regard to this, he lays down his
burden, and, taking his axe, cuts through the bark of a tree; from the
thickness or thinness of which he can tell the north point at once, the
bark being thicker on that side.

For a couple of weeks after this, I remained at the post with my
solitary man, endeavouring by all the means in my power to dispel ennui;
but it was a hard task. Sometimes I shouldered my gun and ranged about
the forest in search of game, and occasionally took a swim in the sea.
_I_ was ignorant at the time, however, that there were sharks in the
Gulf of St. Lawrence, else I should have been more cautious. The
Indians afterwards told me that they were often seen, and several
gentlemen who had lived long on the coast corroborated their testimony.
Several times Indians have left the shores of the gulf in their canoes,
to go hunting, and have never been heard of again, although the weather
at the ti