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Updated: June 27, 2025
We had thought our Ottawa slides very fast, though the greatest speed we ever attained was about thirty miles an hour, whilst at home we had been delighted if we could coax fifteen miles an hour out of our rough machines. The Lansdowne boys were very expert on toboggans, and could go down the Ottawa slides standing erect, a thing no adult could possibly manage.
Why, sir, in the show rooms of the artists in this city and you will see the same in artists' rooms of England and even Europe there are sketches of Canadian scenes, and almost invariably something wintry is suggested men in great fur overcoats and caps, muffled up to the eyes, and with capouches that seemed capacious enough to carry a week's stock of provisions, and yet have spare room; the men generally having on snow-shoes and accompanied with Indians to wait on them, and dogs to drag their toboggans, while all around them are heaps of snow piled up on huge rocks, and overtopping and bearing down short scrubby pines and firs.
We should have had a toboggan, but toboggans are little used on the Koyukuk, and we had only our sled. In five hours we made five miles and were worn out. We decided to pitch our tent and go ahead and break trail for the morrow's journey. On the lakes interspersed amongst the brush we had to break an entirely new trail, for we could find no trace of the old one.
We had no "double-rippers" or toboggans, but six or seven of the long ribs of a buffalo, fastened together at the larger end, answered all practical purposes. Sometimes a strip of bass-wood bark, four feet long and about six inches wide, was used with considerable skill.
Ahead was a man with a candle in a tin can, peering for the faint indications of the trail on the ice; the other two were at the handle-bars of the toboggans. It is strange that in this day of invention and improvement in artificial illumination, a candle in a tin can is still the most dependable light for the trail.
Bob lashed his tent, cooking utensils, some traps and a supply of provisions upon one of two toboggans that leaned against the tilt outside. The other one was for Bill when he should need it. Dick did up his blanket and a few provisions into a light pack, new slings were adjusted to their snow-shoes and finally they were ready to strike the trails.
They drew but two lightly loaded toboggans, and unencumbered by the wigwam and other heavy camp equipment, and with no trailing squaws to hamper their speed, an even, unbroken gait was maintained as mile after mile slipped behind them.
Five minutes later, with a rush and a whoop the first toboggans came flying down the slope. Their course was, perhaps, a trifle erratic, and apt to be followed by a spill at the bottom, but these were unimportant details only to be expected in the first run of the season, and the style improved with every fresh start.
In winter it is hauled by dogs between Selkirk and Or ford House, but between the latter post and York Factory it is hauled by men with toboggans. All mails in and out from Hudson Bay to or from the next post in the interior are hauled by men.
Down, down they ran, till just below lay a village if village it was when only a house or two were gathered together for company in the forest. The snow seemed to have lain here for days, for the car slipped and skidded at the steep entrance, where the boys of the village had made slides for their toboggans.
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