CHAPTER ELEVEN
It was the Flying-Up Moon--deep and slumbering midsummer--in all
the land of Keewatin. From Hudson Bay to the Athabasca and from
the Hight of Land to the edge of the Great Barrens, forest, plain,
and swamp lay in peace and forgetfulness under the sun-glowing
days and the star-filled nights of the August MUKOO-SAWIN. It was
the breeding moon, the growing moon, the moon when all wild life
came into its own once more. For the trails of this wilderness
world--so vast that it reached a thousand miles east and west and
as far north and south--were empty of human life. At the Hudson
Bay Company's posts--scattered here and there over the illimitable
domain of fang and claw--had gathered the thousands of hunters and
trappers, with their wives and children, to sleep and gossip and
play through the few weeks of warmth and plenty until the strife
and tragedy of another winter began. For these people of the
forests it was MUKOO-SAWIN--the great Play Day of the year; the
weeks in which they ran up new debts and established new credits
at the Posts; the weeks in which they foregathered at every Post
as at a great fair--playing, and making love, and marrying, and
fattening up for the many days of hunger and gloom to come.
Pages:
105
106
107
108
109
110
111
112
113
114
115
116
117
118
119
120
121
122
123
124
125
126
127
128
129