SPECTATOR'S LIBRARY.
Adventures on the Columbia River, including the Narrative of a Residence among various Tribes of Indians, hitherto unknown. Together with a Journey across the American Continent. By Ross Cox. 2 vols. Colburn and Bentley. FICTION, Newton Forster, or The Merchant Service. By the Author of " The King's Own." 3 vols. Cochrane and Co. The Usurer's Daughter. By a Contributor to Blackwood's Magazine. 3 vols. Simpkin and Marshall. POLITICS,
Swing Unmasked; or the Cause of Rural Incendiarism. By Edward Gibbon Wake-
field, Esq. E. Wilson.
ROSS COX.
MR. Ross Cox's Adventures on the Columbia River is a curious history of American savages, and of European fur traders, not much less savage than the people whose hunting spoils they ven- ture so far to purchase. The Hudson's Bay and the North-West and the Pacific Fur Companies were not long since the representa- tives of the civilized world among the Red Indians of North Ame- rica in the high latitudes ; and with the exception of the last, which was an American speculation, still continue dealing in beaver-skins, as another company of still greater magnitude in the East deals in tea, and in a similar manner monopolizes all the advantages derived from selling either tea or skins at one-and-twenty times the cost price. The trade is carried on by means of agents, who settle in the centre of the Indian districts, and, with the aid of numerous at- tendants, set up a fort to fight from and a counter to trade upon. These men enter the wilds and forests of America, by the rivers, with boats and carriages full of gewgaws, nicknacks, tobacco, and spirits ; and if they are opposed, make their way by force—if they are conciliated, they return the kindness by teaching the savages the refined arts of chewing and smokino. ; until they have arrived at a quarter sufficiently cold to induce Nature to clothe her animals in fur : then begins the slaughter and the traffic. It seems that the Hudson's Bay Company, having the priority, had secured to itself the whole side of a vast continent, and the greater part of the interior; and, sanctifying the same to its own notions of profit and gain, grew indolent, and rich enough at least to satisfy all those that had a share in its pickings or skinnings,— when another society, jealous of its wide sway and extended profits, started with a grant of a few more degrees of trading ground—in fact, the monopoly of half a dozen Great Britains, but bounded on the East by the dominions of the Hudson's Bay Company. Then • came the tug of war ! frontier was opposed to frontier ; and while the King's Speech talked of assurances of pacification, or of cor- diality with all Foreign Powers, the King's companies were daily receiving returns of killed and wounded that would have done honour to the Gazette. The wily Yankee, seeing how affairs stood, resolved upon taking the high contending parties in flank. Another company was fitted out, which approached the continent from the Pacific, and stationed its head-quarters at the mouth of the Columbia; hoping thereby to secure the trade of that coast up to the Russian settlements, and at the same time gradually creep up to the borders of the dominions of the North-West Com- pany ; thus dividing the continent into three great strips. It is possible that the Pacific Fur might have established its wide do- main, had it not been for the war into which we fell with the United States, when our superior naval force on those coasts ren- dered the continuance of its merchandise hazardous, and indeed impracticable. Into this service Mr. CQX was inlisted; and when the American Company was obliged to dispose of its stock to the warlike bands of the Nor-Westers, as they call themselves, Mr. Cox was drafted into their service, as agent or clerk,—by which is understood, a captain of adventurers, the commander of a fort, the head of a caravan, the foreman of a trading store, the great White chief among a nation of Red supplicators for rum and to- bacco, muskets and blankets.
Mr. Cox, in pursuance of his orders, accompanied a fleet of some twenty or thirty bateaux and canoes up the Columbia, laden with beads and bullets, guns and gewgaws. The party consisted of partners in the concern, clerks, Canadian voyageurs, and Sand- wich Islanders. The Columbia is a noble river, of imnye,nse volume, and navigable to large vessels for several hundred miles. The navigation is stopped by the rapids and waterfalls : they are called in Canada portages, because the voyageur is, on arriving at these obstacles, compelled to carry his canoe and his bales. It is at these points that the Indians make their attack; and many are the pirtage fights which are recorded in these volumes. On arriving at the mouths of certain tributary streams, the fleet separates, and some seek their appointed trading stations in one direction and some in others. Mr. Cox was one of a division that had to pursue its course some hundreds of miles across the desert towards the Rocky Mountains. In following this track, our tra- veller lost his company, and wandered about the wilds for fourteen days nearly without clothing : it was very hot, and he had thrown nearly all his attire off, when he was left sleeping in an arbour of hips and haws upon the illimitable plains that extend from Lewis River to the mountains that divide Western from Eastern North America. His adventures are very extraordinary : he was in the midst of all those animals—such as deer, ducks, geese, hares and rabbits—of which man usually makes his luxuries; and yet he was starving for lack of food. He was unable, for want of any of the artificial means which human beings use, to circumvent the infe- zior animals : he would gladly have roasted his venison and grilled his game, but he possessed no means of butchery; whereas the denizens of the forest, whom Nature had gifted with offensive weapons, preserved their armour entire. • He was exposed to the attacks of rattlesnakes, wolves, and bears, who. persecuted him incessantly; the beasts of the field were hungry, and his resistance to their wishes diminished daily, because he himself was suffering from a similar necessity—his strength fell away hourly. One night, he was lying down upon some grass he had pulled for his bed, and he found it was on a nest of some fifty rattlesnakes. On another night, he was met by a wolf, who disputed the path with him for upwards of half an hour. In another, he had crept into the trunk of a hollow tree, laid prostrate by lightning, when he was roused at the end of an hour or two by a huge bear, who was watching hiS awakening : as he sprung up with a cry, his enemy retreated, and Cox made for a tree; the bear ascended after him ; the gentleman of civilized life, however, had seized a stick, and applying it to the muzzle and paws of his pursuer, he soon caused him to descend, and had the satisfaction of seeing the bear take possession of the hollow tree which he himself had just left : in the morning, it came to be a question of who could resist hunger the longest; in which accomplishment, the gentleman of the world was found superior to the gentleman of the forest— when breakfast-time came, the bear departed, casting many a longing, lingering look behind. Mr. Cox ultimately fell in with some Indians, who had seen his caravan; and he at length rejoined them, after a course of suffering that has not been often equalled. Knowledge is power : had Mr. Cox been acquainted with what he afterwards learnt, he might have found roots and fruits which would altogether have relieved him from the terror of death by starvation. One European was lost for thirty-five days in these plains : he made fish-snares out of the hair of his head, and dug traps with such means as he could procure; still, at the expi- ration of that time, he was crawling on is hands and his feet from weakness and inanition.
Mr. Cox appears ultimately to have gained not only some an ; thority with his company, but considerable influence over the In . dians • amongst whom he remained pretty nearly six years ; when he returned home across the Continent to Canada,—an immense voyage, the features of which add variety to his very amusing volumes.
The value of this work is multifarious. The geographical in- formation is copious; for the tracts of country which the author describes are almost unknown : what little information we have, is chiefly derived from LEWIS and Cr. .Rim's very interesting Tra- vels, which extended into the same district : but no traveller can gain that mastery of a country which is within the reach of a resident for years, more especially when such resident is a young, active, and adventurous spirit, like our friend Ross Cox. His anecdotes and characteristic traits of the Indians give us as com- plete a knowledge of numerous tribes of these interesting people as is anywhere to be found. We would more particularly refer to his accounts of the contending nations of the Black-Feet and the Flat-Heads. In these remote districts, the Europeans have lent fire and flint to the wild encounters of the natives; but their runt and blankets have not yet reduced, as they have nearer to the United States, the noble savage to a miserable dependence upon the store of the merchant. The accounts of some of the chiefs, more especially the Spokan chief, whose wife had been taken pri- soner and tortured by the enemy, and who spent days and days in. solitude in the woods—and of the other chief, who lived apart from his people, attended by children alone, and who spent his time in tracing stars and puzzling European strangers by his posing ques- tions in morality—are characters that would have made the fortune of a book in the hands of a JOHNSON Or a CHATEAUBRI AND.
Previous page
