Reading — The pemmican post
Read both passages. Then answer the questions.
Passage A — A post on the Qu'Appelle
The Qu'Appelle Valley is home to Cree, Saulteaux, Nakoda, and Dakota peoples. Over 200 years ago, the North West Company built a trading post on the Qu'Appelle River, near where Rocanville, Saskatchewan, is today. It is now called Fort Espérance. Cree and Nakoda hunters, and later Métis hunters, brought bison meat and hides to trade. In 1812, a young Métis man named Cuthbert Grant came to work at the post as a clerk. He was about 19 years old.
Passage B — Food for the brigades
The post was famous for pemmican. Women did the skilled work of drying the meat, pounding it, and mixing it with melted fat. Sometimes they added saskatoon berries. The pemmican was packed into hide bags that weighed about 90 pounds each. Canoe brigades carried the bags far away to feed the people who paddled the long fur-trade routes. Each paddler carried two pieces at every portage.
- pemmican
- brigade
- portage
- clerk
- piece
