CHAPTER III.
Dr.Richardson's Residence at Cumberland House--His Account of the Cree Indians.
1820.

January 19.
From the departure of Messrs.

Franklin and Back, on the 19th of January, for Chipewyan, until the opening of the navigation in the spring, the occurrences connected with the Expedition were so much in the ordinary routine of a winter's residence at Fort Cumberland, that they may be, perhaps, appropriately blended with the following general but brief account of that district and its inhabitants.
Cumberland House was originally built by Hearne, a year or two after his return from the Copper-Mine{15} River, and has ever since been considered by the Hudson's Bay Company as a post of considerable importance.

Previous to that time, the natives carried their furs down to the shores of Hudson's Bay, or disposed of them nearer home to the French Canadian traders, who visited this part of the country as early as the year 1697.
The Cumberland House district, extending about one hundred and fifty miles from east to west along the banks of the Saskatchawan, and about as far from north to south, comprehends, on a rough calculation, upwards of twenty thousand square miles, and is frequented at present by about one hundred and twenty Indian hunters.

Of these a few have several wives, but the majority only one; and, as some are unmarried, we shall not err greatly in considering the number of married women as only slightly exceeding that of the hunters.