he says, 'was to them an undertaking of immense difficulty
and labour. To fell a tree with no other implements than
hatchets of stone was employment for a month. ...Their
operations in agriculture were equally slow and defective.
In a country covered with woods of the hardest timber,
the clearing of a small field destined for culture required
the united efforts of a tribe, and was a work of much
time and great toil.'

The religion of the Algonquin Indians seems to have been
a rude nature worship. The Sun, as the great giver of
warmth and light, was the object of their adoration; to
a lesser degree, they looked upon fire as a superhuman
thing, worthy of worship. The four winds of heaven,
bringing storm and rain from the unknown boundaries of
the world, were regarded as spirits. Each Indian clan or
section of a tribe chose for its special devotion an
animal, the name of which became the distinctive symbol
of the clan. This is what is meant by the 'totems' of
the different branches of a tribe.

The Algonquins knew nothing of the art of writing, beyond
rude pictures scratched or painted on wood. The Algonquin
tribes, as we have seen, roamed far to the west. One
branch frequented the upper Saskatchewan river. Here the
ashes of the prairie fires discoloured their moccasins
and turned them black, and, in consequence, they were
called the Blackfeet Indians. Even when they moved to
other parts of the country, the name was still applied
to them.