The snow had scarcely been enough at any time to permit the Indians to track the deer; in fact, all the game had been driven off by the troops and war-parties scouring the country through the preceding summer.
We heard of their dying by companies from mere inanition, and lying stretched in the road to the Portage, whither they were striving to drag their exhausted frames.

Soup made of the bark of the slippery elm, or stewed acorns, were the only food that many had subsisted on for weeks.
We had for a long time received our own food by daily rations from the garrison, for things had got to such a pass that there was no possibility of obtaining a barrel of flour at a time.

After our meals were finished I always went into the pantry, and collecting carefully every remaining particle of food set it aside, to be given to some of the wretched applicants by whom we were constantly thronged.
One day as I was thus employed, a face appeared at the window with which I had once been familiar.

It was the pretty daughter of the elder Day-kau-ray.

She had formerly visited us often, watching with great interest our employments--our sewing, our weeding and cultivating the garden, or our reading.