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1 I was once 'camped' with a party of Chippeways, on one of the small streams or creeks, which recieving the drainings of large tracks of forest in spring when the thaws have melted the snows and almost inundated the country, run into Lake Huron. At any other season they are nearly stagnant, unless an unusual quantity of rain or a freshet on the lake causes them to flow.
In winter these creeks being frozen afford an excellent road into the woods, and they are generally chosen by the Indians as a spot near where to erect their temporary camps during the winter hunt.
Although the different nations are now so mixed & amalgamated, as to render their interest effaced: the same yet in the Indian Country without the settlements, they still have their distinct hunting grounds; any encroachment on which by a different tribe, is considered an infringement on the law of the woods, and occasions not infrequently much dissension and bad blood amongst them.
The spot selected by my party, which consisted of six Indians and myself, was on a creek running into the lake, at a distance of 50 miles from the nearest clearing. It wound in a serpentine course, many miles into the woods, and at the distance of about 15 or 20 miles from the lake shore, ran through some fine tracts of timber land which is called in the language of the country a beech ridge. This tree always prefers ridges of high land, and a lighter or sandier soil, than is found in the lower lands. Here the game is always plentiful, the deer loving to browse on the young saplings, the wild turkey feeding on the nuts, and the bears generally choosing the hollow of a beech tree wherein to ensconce themselves during the rigours of winter. The beech is also the chosen quarters of the black squirrel, which little animal often varies the venison or bears meat dinner of the Indian or White hunter.
Arriving on this creek after several days journey from Lake Erie on the banks of which we had followed our fall hunt, we fixed upon a space of about fifty square yards of crossed out: elevated open ground, formed by the sudden bend of the creeks and surrounded by a wall of lofty beech tress. Here, for the first two days we formed a temporary shelter of branches, whilst we occupied ourselves in hunting and laying in a stack of venison to supply us during the time we might be engaged building our shanty.