Great Slave Lake, at no very
distant period. Their language, traditions, and customs, are essentially
the same with those of the Chipewyans, but in personal character they
have greatly the advantage of that people; owing, probably, to local
causes, or perhaps to their procuring their food more easily and in
greater abundance. They hold women in the same low estimation as the
Chipewyans do, looking upon them as a kind of property, which the
stronger may take from the weaker, whenever there is just reason for
quarrelling, if the parties are of their own nation, or whenever they
meet, if the weaker party are Dog-ribs or other strangers. They suffer,
however, the kinder affections to shew themselves occasionally; they,
in general, live happily with their wives, the women are contented with
their lot, and we witnessed several instances of strong attachment. Of
their kindness to strangers we are fully qualified to speak; their love
of property, attention to their interests, and fears for the future,
made them occasionally clamorous and unsteady; but their delicate and
humane attention to us, in a season of great distress, at a future
period, are indelibly engraven on our memories. Of their notions of a
Deity, or future state, we never could obtain any satisfactory account;
they were unwilling, perhaps, to expose their opinions to the chance of
ridicule. Akaitcho generally evaded our questions on these points, but
expressed a desire to learn from us, and regularly attended Divine
Service during his residence at the fort, behaving with the utmost
decorum.

This leader, indeed, and many others of his tribe, possess a laudable
curiosity, which might easily be directed to the most important ends;
and I believe, that a well-conducted Christian mission to this quarter
would not fail of producing the happiest effect. Old Keskarrah alone
used boldly to express his disbelief of a Supreme Deity, and state that
he could not credit the existence of a Being, whose power was said to
extend every where, but whom he had not yet seen, although he was now an
old man. The aged sceptic is not a little conceited, as the following
exordium to one of his speeches evinces: "It is very strange that I
never meet with any one who is equal in sense to myself." The same old
man, in one of his communicative moods, related to us the following
tradition. The earth had been formed, but continued enveloped in total
darkness, when a bear and a squirrel met on