Chapter One.

The Wolf Trap.

That Oowikapun was unhappy, strangely so, was evident to all in the Indian village. New thoughts deeply affecting him had in some way or other entered into his mind, and he could not but show that they were producing a great change in him.

The simple, quiet, monotonous life of the young Indian hunter was curiously broken in upon, and he could never be the same again. There had come a decided awakening; the circle of his vision had suddenly enlarged, and he had become aware of the fact that he was something more than he imagined. While, in his simple faith, he had paddled along the beautiful rivers, or wandered through the wild forests of his country, catching the fish or hunting the game, where at times he had heard the thunder’s crash and seen the majestic tree riven by the lightning’s power, and perhaps in these seasons of nature’s wild commotion had “seen God in cloud and heard him in the wind,” yet until very lately he had never heard of anything which had caused him to imagine that he was in any way allied to that Great Spirit, or was in any way responsible to him.

What was the cause of this mental disquietude, of these long hours of absorbing thought?

To answer these inquiries we must go back a little, and accompany him on a hunting trip which he made in the forest months ago.

Hearing from some other hunters of a place where grey wolves were numerous, and being ambitious to kill some of these fierce brutes, that he might adorn his wigwam with their warm skins, he took his traps and camping outfit and set out for that region of country, although it was more than two hundred miles away. Here he found tracks in abundance, and so before he made his little hunting lodge in the midst of a spruce grove, he set his traps for the fierce wolves in a spot which seemed to be a rallying place of theirs. As they are very suspicious and clever, he carefully placed two traps close together and sprinkled them over with snow, leaving visible only the dead rabbits which served as bait. Then scattering more snow over his own tracks as he moved away, in order to leave as little evidence of his having been there as possible, he returned to his little tentlike lodge and prepared and ate his supper, smoked his pipe, and then wrapping himself up in his blanket was soon fast asleep. Very early next morning he was up and off to visit his traps. His axe was slipped in his belt, and his gun, well loaded, was carried ready for use if necessary. When he had got within a few hundred yards of the place where he had set his heavy traps, he heard the rattling of the chains which were attached to them, each fastened to a heavy log. This sound, while it made his heart jump, was very welcome, for it meant that he had been successful. When he drew near the spot where he had set the traps, he found that a fierce old wolf, in trying to get the rabbit from one of them without springing it, had got caught in the other, and although both of his hind legs were held by the sharp teeth of the trap, he had managed to drag it and the heavy log fastened to it to quite a distance.

When Oowikapun drew near, the wolf made the most desperate efforts to escape; but the strong trap held him securely, and the heavy log on the chain made it impossible for him to get far away.

Oowikapun could easily have shot him, but ammunition was dear and the bullet hole in the skin would be a blemish, and the sound of the gun might scare away the game that might be near; so he resolved to kill the wolf with the back of his axe. Better would it have been for him if he had shot him at once. So putting down his gun he took his axe out of his belt and cautiously approached the treacherous brute. The sight of the man so near seemed to fill him with fury, and, unable to escape, he made the most desperate efforts to reach him. His appearance, was demoniacal, and his howls and snarls would have terrified almost anybody else than an experienced, cool-headed hunter.

Oowikapun, seeing what an ugly customer he had to deal with, very cautiously kept just beyond the limits of the fearful plunges which the chain would allow the wolf to make, and keenly watched for an opportunity to strike him on the head. So wary and quick was the wolf that some blows received only maddened without disabling him.

Oowikapun at length, becoming annoyed that he should have any difficulty in killing an entrapped wolf, resolved to end the conflict at once with a decisive blow; and so with upraised axe he placed himself as near as he thought safe, and waited for the infuriated brute to spring at him. But so much force did the entrapped brute put into that spring that it carried the log attached to the chain along with him, and his sharp, glittering fang-like teeth snapped together within a few inches of Oowikapun’s throat, and such was the force of the concussion that he was hurled backward, and ere he could assume the aggressive, the sharp teeth of the wolf had seized his left arm, which he threw up for defence, and seemed to cut down to the very bone, causing intense pain. But Oowikapun was a brave man and cool-headed, so a few blows from the keen edge of the axe in his right hand finished his foe, whose only weapons were his sharp teeth, and he was soon lying dead in the snow; but his beautiful skin was about worthless as a robe on account of the many gashes it had received, much to the annoyance of Oowikapun, who had not dreamed of having so severe a battle.

The traps were soon reset and Oowikapun, with the heavy wolf on his back, set out for his camp. As he had set some smaller traps for minks and martens in a different direction, he turned aside to visit them. This would cause him to return to his camp by another trail. While moving along under his heavy load he was surprised to come across the snowshoe tracks of another hunter. He examined them carefully, and decided that they were made by some person who must have passed along there that very morning, early as it was.

As the trail of this stranger, whoever it could be, was in the direction of the traps which Oowikapun wished to visit, he followed them up. When he reached his traps he found that a mink had been caught in one of them, but the stranger had taken it out and hung it up in plain sight above the trap on the branch of a tree. Then the stranger, putting on fresh bait, had reset the trap. Of course Oowikapun was pleased with this, and delighted that the stranger, whoever he was, had acted so honestly and kindly toward him.

Fastening the mink in his belt he hurried on to his camp as fast as he could under his heavy load, for his wounded arm had begun to swell and was causing him intense pain. His stoical Indian nature would have caused him to withstand the pain with indifference, but when he remembered how the wolf, maddened by his capture, had wrought himself up into such a frenzy that his mouth was all foaming with madness when he made that last desperate spring and succeeded in fastening his fangs in his arm, he feared that perhaps some of the froth might have got into his arm, and unless some remedies were quickly obtained, madness might come to him, to be followed by a most dreadful death.

But what could he do? He was several days’ journey from his own village, and many miles from any hunter of his acquaintance. He had, in his vanity, come alone on this hunting expedition, and now alone in the woods, far away from his friends, here he is in his little hunting lodge, a dangerously wounded man.

Fortunately he had taken the precaution of sucking as many of the wounds as he could reach with his mouth, and then had bound a deerskin thong on his arm above the wound as tightly as he could draw it.

Very few, comparatively, were the diseases among the aboriginal tribes of