Oldal 156 [156]
CANADIAN LANDSCAPES/ PAYSAGES CANADIENS
the indigenous population. The taste of innumerable hardships to come is given
early in the narrative, at a depot called Rock House:
Here we were informed that the rapids in the upper parts of Hill River were much
worse and more numerous than those we had passed, particularly in the present
season, owing to the unusual lowness of the water. This intelligence was very mor¬
tifying, especially as the gentlemen in charge of the Company’s boats declared that
they were unable to carry any part of our stores beyond this place; and the traders,
guides, and most experienced of the boatmen, were of opinion, that unless our boat
was still further lightened, the winter would put a stop to our progress before we
could reach Cumberland House, or any eligible post (Franklin I 49, my emphasis).
The author’s vocabulary shows a cultivated style, not only a seaman’s lapidary
expression. We can conclude that the text was embellished with many epithets
post festum, but this feature, coupled with an elegant turn of phrase, provides
the reader with such mediation of the real events that we enjoy the very form
of Franklin’s expression. The travelogue would have been unpalatable if it had
been reduced to mere chronological order of observations with a list of place¬
names visited. The advance through the Canadian wilderness is often halted
with the onset of winter, and sometimes the northern territories lie under ice
until June, so the expedition had to spend months in forts waiting for the thaw.
Halfway through the history, an important “Indian” is introduced: “One of the
guides, named Keskarrah, drew the Copper-Mine River, running through the
Upper Lake, in a westerly direction towards the Great Bear Lake, and then
northerly to the sea. The other guide drew the river in a straight line to the sea
from the above-mentioned place, but, after some dispute, admitted the cor¬
rectness of the first delineation” (Franklin I 318-319).
A minor character would serve as one of the principal driving forces in
Wiebe’s fiction, and thus create a visibly different plotline along the lines of
romantic motivation and the Native point of view. The person from the Tet¬
sot’ine (Yellowknife) tribe is Keskarrah’s own daughter, Greenstockings, aged
15, mentioned only twice in the second volume, and nowhere else:
While speaking of this family, I may remark that the daughter, whom we designated
Green-stockings from her dress, is considered by her tribe to be a great beauty. Mr.
Hood drew an accurate portrait of her, although her mother was averse to her sitting
for it. She was afraid, she said, that her daughter’s likeness would induce the Great
Chief who resided in England to send for the original (Franklin II 27).
The author does not indicate how he came about the information that she had
already belonged to two husbands, probably confining the source to an implied
conversation with tribesmen, as rudimentary anthropological work frequently
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