CHAPTER IX

THE REMOTE KINGDOM OF THE FUR-TRADERS

Section I.-The great Fur-trading Companies

FAR away from the strife of contending political parties, and unvisited, except on Hudson Bay, with the din of border wars, sleeps under its coat of snow the vast kingdom of the fur-traders. Overhead is the dazzling brightness of a northern sky, which at night is covered to the very zenith with dancing auroras. In summer for three, four, or more months, the streams are unbound, a luxuriant vegetation bursts forth, and the summer green is as intense as the wintry whiteness had been.

Here the fur-trader must remain king. Mink and beaver, marten and otter, wolves, foxes, and bears are his subjects, and, as in the case of all autocrats, the subjects exist for the profit of the ruler. "Pro pelle cutem" is the motto of the Hudson's Bay Company.

Perhaps one quarter of North America will always remain the fur-traders' preserve. If a line be drawn from Fort Churchill, on the shore of Hudson Bay, to Norway House, at the northern end of Lake Winnipeg, thence to Fort Resolution on the Great Slave Lake, and westward to the Stikeen River on the Pacific Ocean, the boundary of a region will be marked to the north of which is found the fur-traders' kingdom.

It is true this fur-traders' line has for two centuries been moving northward. Time was, as we have seen, when the region of the great lakes from Ontario to Superior and Michigan was the home of the trader. It was for the fur of this large area that the early governors

A SHORT HISTORY OF THE CANADIAN PEOPLE 283

of New France and New York plotted and fought. So more recently Rupert's Land was kept by the Hudson's Bay Company closed under fur-trading conditions.

By the opening up of this region by the Dominion of Canada, the fur-line was moved north six to ten degrees. Perhaps from the physical condition of the country, as unsuited to agriculture and possessed of a severe climate, the region north of the line traced above may always remain undisturbed to the fur-trader. Of this, however, no one can speak certainly, for the same declaration was made of New York, then of Canada, and later still of Rupert's Land.

More than two centuries ago, a colonial captain, Zachariah Gillam, taking with him two French explorers, Groselliers and Radisson, who had journeyed through New France, departed in two ships, under the direction of English merchants, to plant a post on Hudson Bay, which as we have seen had been discovered sixty years before by Captain Hudson. Radisson in the Eaglet never reached the Bay.

It was in 1668 that Captain Gillam sailed from Gravesend in his ship, the Nonsuch. The New England captain reached the southern extremity of Hudson Bay, and, where Rupert's factory afterwards stood, built a small stone erection, which he named Fort St. Charles, and returned to Britain in 1669.

The merchants interested then obtained the assistance of Prince Rupert, the king's cousin, of General Monk, whom the king had made Duke of Albemarle, and of the skilful Lord Ashley, in obtaining from Charles II. a charter, which they claimed on the ground of their having erected Fort St. Charles; and thus was begun the Company of Merchant Adventurers trading into Hudson Bay. The great fur company was incorporated on Hudson's the 2nd of May, 1670, under Prince Rupert as Bay Comfirst Governor.

pany.

Fifteen years afterwards the Hudson's Bay Company possessed five forts on Hudson Bay, viz. Albany, Hayes, Rupert, Nelson, and Severn. Their trade was conducted

entirely on the shores of the bay, the Indians coming down the rivers from Lake Athabasca and the country of the Christinaux beyond Lake Winnipeg.

We have seen how greatly the fur-trade was disturbed by the inroads of the bold D'Iberville during the last quarter of the seventeenth century. Though for a certain period all their forts were in the hands of the French, yet from time to time the "Merchant Adventurers comforted themselves with a dividend of fifty or more per cent.

In 1749 the successful trade carried on stirred up the envy of rival merchants, and in that year the English Parliament appointed a committee to investigate such charges as that the Hudson's Bay Company was failing to develop trade as fully as might be done. Several works were at this time written on Hudson Bay, and the Blue-book of 1749 contains the report of the committee. While the Company was, in the main, exonerated, yet no doubt the investigation led to the exploration of the interior country a few years after.

The rival traders.

Perhaps the strongest influence leading the Hudson's Bay Company to penetrate the interior was the successful fur-trade of rival merchants. These were the North-West traders of Montreal. So early as 1766 the Scottish merchants of Montreal, Curry, and Findlay followed the route of Verendrye already described, and leaving Lake Superior, reached Lake Winnipeg, and points so far north as English River and the Saskatchewan. The Hudson's Bay Company began to find their trade diminishing, just as the French trade with the Iroquois had been cut off at its sources by Governor Dongan and his English traders of New York.

The fur merchants from Montreal, to prevent rivalry among themselves, for there were no less than six houses in Montreal engaged in this trade, agreed to unite, and thus Messrs. Frobisher, McTavish, McGillivray, Gregory, McLeod, and others became, in the year 1787, the famous North-West Company, or, as they were familiarly called, the "Nor'-Westers." With surprising ability and suc

cess this company carried its trade, and built forts along the route from Montreal up the Ottawa River, on the upper lakes, through the Rainy River region, and to the very Saskatchewan and Athabasca districts. In a few years after, the company pushed on across the Rocky Mountains as far as the Columbia River on the Pacific coast.

The Nor'-Westers became at this time the chief influence in trade, and in public affairs as well, in French Canada. The Executive and Legislative Councils of Lower Canada were made up of Nor'-Westers or those under their influence. Even the judges on the bench must bow before this powerful combination. About the year 1788 the company took permanent hold of trade in the Red River district.

The X Y

Company.

Jealousy, however, entered into the North-West Company councils after a few years, so that in 1796 a section broke off from the old company, calling themselves the "New North-West Company," or better known as the "X Y Company." The leaders in this new association were the Messrs. Gregory, and such afterwards well-known traders as Sir Alexander Mackenzie and the Hon. Edward Ellice. With much energy the young company built trading-posts alongside of their two older rivals, especially beside the Nor'Wester posts, carried on a vigorous trade, and, sad to say, during this period the use of spirituous liquors as a means of trading with the Indians became more common than ever before.

After a few years the keen rivalry ceased, for in 1804 the old and new North-West Companies united. Their union was followed by the best results, for dispensing with rival posts at many points they were able to occupy localities hitherto unvisited, and to build more substantial forts.

Early in the nineteenth century the North-West Company, by way of Peace River, crossed to the Pacific slope, following the course of their noted partner, Sir Alexander Mackenzie. Simon Fraser, a pioneer trader, discovered

the river, which bears his name, in 1806, and built on it the first trading-house in British Columbia, Fort Fraser. David Thompson, the astronomer and surveyor of the North-West Company, crossed by the same route, discovered the British Columbian river, named from him, and chose sites for forts on the Columbia River in 1811. It was at this time that John Jacob Astor, a leading merchant of New York, began the company which bears his name, but which was also

The Astor

Company. known as the "Pacific Fur Company." In

1810, led by the prosperity of the Montreal traders, Mr. Astor engaged a number of Scottish and French Canadian clerks and trappers in Montreal, and sent them by the ship Tonquin, by way of Cape Horn and up the west coast of America, to the mouth of the Columbia River to engage in the fur trade. Here their fort "Astoria was built. They met many reverses; their ship was seized by the natives, and almost all on board were massacred.

The North-West Company, regarding the Astor Company as intruders, boldly opposed them, stirred up the Indians against them, occupied the headwaters of the various streams, and succeeded so well that in 1813 Mr. Astor was glad to sell out to these determined traders of Montreal. Washington Irving has given a vivid sketch of the sufferings of the Americans in his "Astoria." We have already hinted that it was self-preservation which induced the Hudson's Bay ComCompany pany to ascend the streams from Hudson Bay to awakened. the interior. The Nor'-Westers having in 1772 erected Sturgeon Lake Fort, in 1774 Fort Cumberland was built on the Saskatchewan by the Hudson's Bay Company. With true British perseverance, when once undertaken, the movement inland was carried on with great success.

The H. B.

Before the end of the century Fort Edmonton (1795) had been built almost in view of the Rocky Mountains, Carlton (1797) not far from the forks of the great Saskatchewan, Brandon House (1794) at the junction of