rackets, some of the Crees got roots to eat. Others tore the bark from
trees and made a kind of soup that kept them alive. Two weeks after
the famine set in, the Indians were boiling the pulverized bones of the
waste heap. After that the only food was the buckskin that had been
tanned for clothing. "We ate it so eagerly," writes Radisson, "that
our gums did bleed. . . . We became the image of death." Before the
spring five hundred Crees had died of famine. Radisson and Groseillers
scarcely had strength to drag the dead from the tepees. The Indians
thought that Groseillers had been fed by some fiend, for his heavy,
black beard covered his thin face. Radisson they loved, because his
beardless face looked as gaunt as theirs.[6]

Relief came with the breaking of the weather. The rain washed the iced
snows away; deer began to roam; and with the opening of the rivers came
two messengers from the Sioux to invite Radisson and Groseillers to
visit their nation. The two Sioux had a dog, which they refused to
sell for all Radisson's gifts. The Crees dared not offend the Sioux
ambassadors by stealing the worthless cur on which such hungry eyes
were cast, but at night Radisson slipped up to the Sioux tepee. The
dog came prowling out. Radisson stabbed it so suddenly that it dropped
without a sound. Hurrying back, he boiled and fed the meat to the
famishing Crees. When the Sioux returned to their own country, they
sent a score of slaves with food for the starving encampment. No doubt
Radisson had plied the first messengers with gifts; for the slaves
brought word that thirty picked runners from the Sioux were coming to
escort the white men to the prairie. To receive their benefactors, and
also, perhaps, to show that they were not defenceless, the Crees at
once constructed a fort; for Cree and Sioux had been enemies from time
immemorial. In two days came the runners, clad only in short garments,
and carrying bow and quiver. The Crees led the young braves to the