ar wages, and bringing in all the furs
which he can obtain. Be they more or less, he receives his stipulated
monthly wages. The free trapper is supplied by the company with traps
and certain other conveniences with which he plunges into the forest on
his own hook, engaging however to sell to the company, at a stipulated
price, whatever furs he may secure.

The outfit of the trapper as he penetrated the vast and trackless region
of gloomy forests, treeless prairies, and solitary rivers, spreading
everywhere around him, generally consisted of two or three horses, one
for the saddle and the others for packs containing his equipment of
traps, ammunition, blankets, cooking utensils, etc., in preparation for
passing lonely months in the far away solitudes. He would endeavor to
find, if possible, a region which neither the white man nor the Indian
had ever visited.

The dress of the hunter consisted of a strong shirt of well-dressed and
pliant buckskin, ornamented with long fringes. The vanity of dress, if
it may be so called, followed him into regions where no eye but his own
could see its beauties. His pantaloons were also made of buckskin
decorated with variously-colored porcupine quills and with long fringes
down the outside of the leg. Moccasins, often quite gorgeously
embroidered, fitted closely to his feet. A very flexible hat or cap
covered his head, generally of felt, obtained from some Indian trader.
There was suspended over his left shoulder, so as to hang beneath his
right arm, a powder horn and bullet pouch. In the latter he carried
balls, flints, steel, and various odds and ends. A long heavy rifle he
bore upon his shoulder.

A belt of buckskin buckled tightly around the waist, held a large
butcher knife in a sheath of stout buffalo hide, and also a buckskin
case containing a whet-stone. A small hatchet or tomahawk was also
attached to this belt. Thus rigged and in a new dress the hunter of good
proportions presented a very picturesque aspect. With no little pride he
exhibited himself at the trading posts, where not only the squaws and
the children, but veteran hunters and Indian braves contemplated his
person with admiration.

Thus provided the hunter, more frequently alone but sometimes
accompanied by two or three others, set out for the mountain streams, as
early in the spring as the melting ice would enable him to commence
operations against the beaver.

Arrived on his hunting ground he carefully ascend