114 THE GREAT DENE RACE.

Add to this that, when not spoiled by contact with unscrupulous whites,
they are remarkably honest. Speaking of the Loucheux Dall writes: “During
a long experience I have never known of goods being meddled with or
broken open if proberly secured, no matter how lonely the situation of the
cache, or how long it remained unvisited. ‘A cache is sacred’ is one of the
axioms of the wilderness. This goes far to prove that the average ol honesty
among these Indians is higher than that which obtains among white men’’?.
He then adds that the Eskimos are less trustworthy, and again further on he
says of the Loucheux: “They are more honest than the majority of une-
ducated whites, and much more so than the tribes who have been degraded
by liquor’.

Fred. Whymper writes of the same people: “At this, and other Ingelete
villages, our goods lay unguarded in our absence, and I cannot recall a single
case of proved dishonesty among them’’®.

Of the Chippewayans Franklin similarly said that “it should be stated
that instances of theft are extremely rare amongst them’‘ in spite of their
abject poverty.

Richardson also dilates on what he terms “their strict honesty”, obser-
ving that “the practice of the Tinné with regard to the property of white
people [differs] remarkably from their northern neighbours, the Eskimos, and
their southern ones, the Crees, though the temptations to which they are
exposed are equally great. No precautions for the safety of our property at
Fort Confidence were required. The natives carefully avoided touching the
magnetic instruments, thermometers, and other things placed outside the house,
and could be trusted in any of the rooms without our finding a single article
displaced. Our dining-hall was open to all comers; and though the smallness
of our separate apartments caused us to exclude hangers-on, new comers
were permitted to satisfy their curiosity respecting our occupations, and they
always squatted themselves down at the door, and looked on in silence, won-
dering, as we were told, at our constant writing. From M. La Fléche, the
intelligent missionary at Isle 4 la Crosse®, | received a similar character of
the southern part of the nation, who, if they find any article left by the
voyagers on the portages, are sure to bring it in to be claimed at the forts’ ®.

Doctor Richard King, who accompanied Captain G. Back in his over-
land journey to the shores of the Arctic Ocean, is even more explicit on this
point, and the instances of the Dénés’ honesty he quotes are sufficient to put
to the blush many a Christian nation. “Their honesty is so strict”, he writes,

1 «Travels on the Yukon”, p. 133.

? Ibid., pp. 193—94.

2 “Travel and Adventure in the Territory of Alaska”, p. 154.
4 “Journey to the Shores of the Polar Sea”, vol. II, p. 53.
Who died Bishop of Three Rivers, Lower Canada.

6 “Arctic Searching Expedition”, vol. II, pp. 19—20.

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