But the Red men of the Company's territories, compared to these, were pacific. Occasionally want or deep injustice drove them to acts of barbarism, as we have seen in the case of the massacre at York Factory under Jérémie's _régime_; but on the whole they had no marked enmity to the white men, and long displayed a remarkable and extremely welcome docility. [Sidenote: Character of the Assiniboines.] "The Assinibouels," remarked Jérémie, "are humane and affable; and so are also all those Indians with whom we have commerce in the Bay, never trading with the French but as their fathers and patrons. Although savages, they are foes to lying, which is extraordinary in nations which live without subordination or discipline. One cannot impute to them any vice, unless they are a little too slanderous. They never blaspheme and have not even a term in their language which defines an oath." If we are to believe the early traders and explorers, the Red man of Rupert's Land spoke a tongue by no means difficult for an Englishman to master. Yet if these same traders really took the trouble to master it, as they alleged, their knowledge certainly brought little order into the chaos of tribal nomenclature. [Illustration: INDIAN TEPEE.] The custom of fantastic names for the Indians was long continued. More than one instance occur of the impropriety with which the French-Canadians named the Indians. They called one tribe Gros Ventres, or Big Bellies, and that without any known reason; they being as comely and well-made as any other tribe. "They are very far," says one trader, "from being remarkable for their corpulency." This tribe also came to be known as the Fall Indians. [Sidenote: Indian country.] Jérémie observed that the Ouinebigonnolinis inhabited the sea-coast. The Poaourinagou country was inhabited by the Miskogonhirines or Savannah, who made war with the Hakouchirmions. Twelve leagues above York Factory was situated the River Oujuragatchousibi, while far beyond dwelt the Nakonkirhirinons. One might readily suspect one commandant of drawing upon his imagination when he speaks of such nations as the Unighkillyiakow, Ishisageck Roanu, the Twightwis Roanu, the Oskiakikis, Oyachtownuck Roanu, Kighetawkigh Roanu, and the Kirhawguagh Roanu. [Illustration: AN ASSINIBOINE INDIAN.] In the seventeenth century, the districts about the Great Lakes were rather thickly populated. Certain regions which at the opening of the eighteenth century were but thinly sprinkled by inhabitants, once had boasted numerous tribes. For when the first missionaries visited the south of Lake Superior in 1668, they found the country full of inhabitants. They relate that, about this time, a band of Nepisingues, converts to the Jesuitical teaching, emigrated to the Nepigon country. By 1785 few of their descendants were said to exist, and not a trace amongst them of the religion espoused by their ancestors.