r usual occupations. They were employed
during a great part of the year in navigating the Hudson's Bay Company's
boats, laden with furs and goods, through the labyrinth of rivers and
lakes that stud and intersect the whole continent, or they were engaged
in pursuit of the bisons, [these animals are always called buffaloes by
American hunters and fur-traders] which roam the prairies in vast herds.

They were dressed in the costume of the country: most of them wore
light-blue cloth capotes, girded tightly round them by scarlet or
crimson worsted belts. Some of them had blue, and others scarlet, cloth
leggings, ornamented more or less with stained porcupine quills,
coloured silk, or variegated beads; while some might be seen clad in the
leathern coats of winter-deer-skin dressed like chamois leather, fringed
all round with little tails, and ornamented much in the same way as
those already described. The heavy winter moccasins and duffel socks,
which gave to their feet the appearance of being afflicted with gout,
were now replaced by moccasins of a lighter and more elegant character,
having no socks below, and fitting tightly to the feet like gloves.
Some wore hats similar to those made of silk or beaver which are worn by
ourselves in Britain, but so bedizened with scarlet cock-tail feathers,
and silver cords and tassels, as to leave the original form of the
head-dress a matter of great uncertainty. These hats, however, are only
used on high occasions, and chiefly by the fops. Most of the men wore
coarse blue cloth caps with peaks, and not a few discarded head-pieces
altogether, under the impression, apparently, that nature had supplied a
covering which was in itself sufficient. These costumes varied not only
in character but in quality, according to the circumstances of the
wearer; some being highly ornamental and mended--evincing the felicity
of the owner in the possession of a good wife--while others were soiled
and torn, or but slightly ornamented. The voyageurs were collected, as
we have said, in groups. Here stood a dozen of the youngest--
consequently the most noisy and showily dressed--laughing loudly,
gesticulating violently, and bragging tremendously. Near to them were
collected a number of sterner spirits--men of middle age, with all the
energy, and muscle, and bone of youth, but without its swaggering
hilarity; men whose powers and nerves had been tried over and over again
amid the stirring scenes of a v