Now as the rival companies keep a vigilant eye upon each other, and are
anxious to discover each other's plans and movements, they generally
contrive to hold their annual assemblages at no great distance apart.
An eager competition exists also between their respective convoys of
supplies, which shall first reach its place of rendezvous. For this
purpose, they set off with the first appearance of grass on the Atlantic
frontier and push with all diligence for the mountains. The company that
can first open its tempting supplies of coffee, tobacco, ammunition,
scarlet cloth, blankets, bright shawls, and glittering trinkets has the
greatest chance to get all the peltries and furs of the Indians and free
trappers, and to engage their services for the next season. It is able,
also, to fit out and dispatch its own trappers the soonest, so as to
get the start of its competitors, and to have the first dash into the
hunting and trapping grounds.
A new species of strategy has sprung out of this hunting and trapping
competition. The constant study of the rival bands is to forestall and
outwit each other; to supplant each other in the good will and custom of
the Indian tribes; to cross each other's plans; to mislead each other as
to routes; in a word, next to his own advantage, the study of the Indian
trader is the disadvantage of his competitor.
The influx of this wandering trade has had its effects on the habits of
the mountain tribes.
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