When the trappers turned homewards they found that the wolverine had followed them closely. On the ground which they had passed over on the previous day, every trap was already demolished and the baits abstracted. Cheadle fondly imagined that at last his enemy was outwitted and destroyed, but Misquapamayoo’s sharper eyes discovered each of the baits which had been poisoned, lying close at hand, bitten in two and rejected, whilst all the others had disappeared. The baits had been made with great care, the strychnine being inserted into the centre of the meat by a small hole, and when frozen it was impossible to distinguish any difference in appearance between them and the harmless ones. It seemed as if the animal suspected poison, and bit in two and tasted every morsel before swallowing it. The baits had purposely been made very small, so that in the ordinary course they would have been bolted whole. That the same wolverine had frequented our path from the first, we knew perfectly well, for he was one of unusually large size, as shown by his tracks, which were readily distinguishable from the others we observed from time to time. On the 28th of December, Milton left Carlton, and resting one night at Treemiss’s hut, arrived the following day at La Belle Prairie. Cheadle and Misquapamayoo had come in just before, and a very pleasant evening was spent in talking over all that had happened during the separation. Associating entirely with Indians until the return of our men, we rapidly picked up the Cree language, and in the course of a few weeks could speak it fluently if not grammatically. Nothing is easier than to get a decent smattering of Cree, although the construction of the language is extremely intricate. The name of many articles is the explanation of their use or properties, the word being a combination of a participle and noun, the latter generally the word _gun_, “a thing;” as _parskisi-gun_, a “shooting thing;” _miniquachi-gun_, a “drinking thing” or cup. This also appears in their proper names, which are generally descriptions of some personal peculiarity; as in the names Kekekooarsis and Keenamontiayoo, which have been mentioned before. The consonants _d_, _f_, and _l_ are not found in the Cree alphabet, and the Indians find great difficulty in pronouncing the two first when trying to use English words. The appropriate gestures and expressive pantomime with which an Indian illustrates his speech, render it easy to understand. We soon learnt to interpret without much difficulty the long hunting stories with which Keenamontiayoo whiled away the evenings in our hut. The scene described was partly acted; the motions of the game, the stealthy approach of the hunter, the taking aim, the shot, the cry of the animal, or the noise of its dashing away, and the pursuit, were all given as the tale went on.