no higher motives than those that actuated the Company they desire to oust. It was the interest of neither Company to promote colonisation, though the Montreal institution, to make a point against the English traders, made a show of encouraging settlement. The influence of both upon the Indian must be conceded to be bad; though their common half-breed descendants may be said to be more useful in the country than the aboriginal inhabitant, and more likely to cultivate and civilise it. But the latter has his rights in the country, as its first possessor; and so long as the tribes exist these rights should be respected and their interests conserved. Not only should they be respected, they should be freely recognised and generously dealt with. The same may be said for their descendants, the Métis.

The exclusive privileges of the Hudson Bay Company, being opposed to the best interests of Canada, and antagonistic to the progress as well as to the spirit of the age, could not, of course, be suffered to run on in perpetua. Its shareholders saw this in 1838, when the last renewal of its charter was granted. They saw this more clearly in 1859, when its charter had run out. At both of these periods there was much agitation over what was termed the usurpation of the Company. While its operations were confined to the shores of Hudson Bay, there were few to call in question its charter, or quarrel with its license to trade. But when its employés ascended the rivers to the plains of the South, they came into collision with the French joint-stock Company, whose traders had long roamed over the valleys of the Assiniboine and the Saskatchewan, and excited prejudice by the claim of privilege and the assumption of power. For many years hostility to the Hudson Bay Company was actively fostered in Canada. Not only was it natural that the Colony should favour its own Company; it was peculiarly its interest to do so. The trade of the North-West Company specially enriched it. It did more: it kept open a home route to the West, and made Montreal the

centre of a large and lucrative trade. After the embroilment of this Company with the Selkirk colony on the Red River, it coalesced with the older English Company, and much of the trade returned to its former outlet on Hudson Bay. This amalgamation did not a little to revive Canadian antipathy to the parent institution. The aggressions in Oregon, and the later extension of its trade to the Pacific, increased public distrust of the Company and fanned the flame of hostility. The Company, moreover, in asserting its power to enact tariffs, to levy taxes, and collect customs dues, made itself more obnoxious, and intensified public feeling against it, when it approached the Imperial authorities for a renewal of its charter.

Its policy towards settlers added to the counts of the indictment which confronted its paid advocates in parliament. Complaints were frequently made that immigrants, after fulfilling the hard conditions imposed upon the settler, failed to get from the Company's officers the title-deeds to their lands. In this respect, it is to be feared, history has repeated itself. Settlers also complained that an embargo was placed upon any little trade with the Indians, which they, on occasion, might effect. Their houses were entered in search of furs, which, when discovered, were confiscated; and the settlers' possessions not infrequently were destroyed and themselves taken captive. The Company's rule in the West was often arbitrary and oppressive. Little was done to ameliorate the condition of the settler's life, but much often to annoy and impoverish him. Water communication was nowhere facilitated, nor were roads opened up. The character and resources of the region were belied, and everything was done to dissuade or retard immigration. It may be doubted whether the country has ever fully recovered from the effects of the circulation of these falsehoods.

Such a policy as we have referred to was sure to react upon the Company. In 1857, the Imperial Parliament empowered a Committee to take evidence in regard to the administration

of the Hudson Bay Company, and to consider the state of the British Possessions in North America under its rule. The report of this Committee exhausts the arguments for and against the Company: the report itself is a model of statesmanlike excellence. It is one of the most valuable State papers in connection with Canadian affairs it has been our privilege to inspect. The eminence and high character of the Committee, its adequate powers, the fulness of the evidence it elicited, and the dispassionateness and impartiality with which it discharged its functions, give a value to the Report unusual among political documents. The finding of the Committee was adverse to the continuance of Hudson Bay Company rule in such portions of the country as were fit for settlement, with which Canada was willing to open and maintain communication, and for which she would provide the means of local administration. In this finding, the Committee not only paid regard to the reasonable desires of the settlers themselves, but had in view the extension of the territory of an important and growing colony, and the interest and policy of the British Crown. The opinion was also expressed, that it would be proper to terminate the Company's connection with Vancouver's Island, as the best means of favouring the development of the great natural resources of that and other portions of the adjacent country which might afterwards become part of a British colony on the Pacific coast. In respect of the remainder of the Hudson Bay Territory," in which, for the present at least, there can be no prospect of settlement for the purposes of colonisation," the Committee thought it desirable that the Company should continue to enjoy the privilege of exclusive trade, and to throw over it and the Indians inhabiting it whatever protection it could afford.*

*It is due here to say that during the sittings of this important Committee of the British Parliament the interests of Canada were most zealously watched by the late Hon. Chief Justice Draper, to whose ability and high sense of honour, the Committee made suitable acknowledgment, as well as expressed its indebteduess

The action taken by Parliament on this weighty Report, and the subsequent negotiations by the Crown for the cession of the Hudson Bay Territories, are matters of history. The immediate result of the transfer was the unhappy outbreak in 1869; though the following year saw the retreat of disloyalty and the advance of law and order. A vast continent came into the possession of the Canadian people ;-boundless stretches of rich prairie, verdant slopes and navigable rivers, with, it must not be concealed, not a little of rock and reeking swamp, and, in the inhospitable north, leagues of snow and desolation. What the country has become in the fifteen years that have elapsed since it passed from the sway of the Hudson Bay Company is no slight tribute to the sagacity and foresight of those who were instrumental in negotiating its transfer to the Canadian people. As a preserve for game it has lost its value; and in this respect the native inhabitant is a keen sufferer, while the fur trader has been despoiled of his trade. But in cattleraising and agriculture, the hunter, as well as the settler, has a more assured means of livelihood than any to be found in the fruits of the chase.

There are problems yet to be worked out in the settlement of the country, in turning the plains from a breeding-ground of buffalo to the purposes of the agriculturist and the civilised settler. But, for their solution, sagacity and prudence should be all that is necessary, coupled with patriotism and the resolution to do right, and to see that right alone is done. Whatever difficulties beset the immediate future, it is hoped that these will neither be prolonged nor insurmountable. The insurgents of the North-West must be cured of their disposition ⚫ to resort to insurgency. No men, race, or class of men, whatever be their grievance, must be suffered to throw over constitutional means of seeking redress; nor should the ear of justice

for valuable information placed by Mr. Draper at its disposal while acting at the enquiry as the representative of the Canadian Government.

be inaccessible, or the hand of administration slow, in the application of a remedy. The resort to arms must be treated with no sentimental, still less with partisan or racial, leniency. Insurrection should meet with speedy suppression, and seditious speech sharply dealt with. There must be unfailing protection to life and property, abiding peace, and absolute security. Only on these conditions can the country be favourably settled, and a material and a moral advance made on the rule of the Hudson Bay Company.