the features showing that the intrepid soul of the missionary had met death in the spirit of calm and trustful resignation

'Like one who draws the drapery of his couch

Around him, and lies down to pleasant dreams.""

But the earliest missions in the country were those of the Roman Catholic Church, whose first representative was the Rev. Father Provencher. This worthy priest came to Red River in 1818, and was made Bishop of Juliopolis four years afterwards. On his death, in 1853, the present distinguished Archbishop Taché succeeded him in the See, the title of which was changed to St. Boniface. Convents and other educational agencies of the Romish Church were established in 1844. But much as we may wish to dwell on the Christian work of the Roman Catholic priesthood and sisterhood in the North-West, our space here does not justify our doing so. As the work was too good and self-sacrificing to be merely passingly acknowledged, we hope elsewhere to do it justice.

Recurring to the material progress of the incipient city, we may note the fact that for some time it rejoiced in the honors of a garrison town. From 1846 to 1848 a wing of the 6th Regiment of Foot was quartered at Red River; and for a number of years following the colony was protected by a corps of enrolled pensioners. Lord Selkirk's detachment of disbanded Swiss did not remain in the colony, but emigrated to more rapidly rising settlements on the Upper Mississippi. From 1837 to 1861 a company of the Royal Canadian Rifles occupied Fort Garry, during the excitement caused by the restless movements on the borders of the Sioux Indians. Their massacre of white settlers in Minnesota occurred in 1862; happily, in their visits to Red River, they were got rid of without bloodshed. In 1853 a public mail service was established,

L

which, to the delight of the settlers, took the place of the biannual packet-post via Hudson Bay. In 1859, that distinguishing mark of civilisation, a local newspaper, was founded, -the "Nor'-Wester" becoming the pioneer of the very able and enterprising modern press of Winnipeg. Three years afterwards, in the placing of a light draft steamboat on the river, facilities were afforded for communicating with the outer world; and the same season the village of Winnipeg was officially ushered into being. Could these means of communication be improved, many of its far-seeing inhabitants prophesied that the day would not be distant when it would become a great city.*

In the history of the Red River colony we now near modern times. The era of absolutism was to go, and that of freedom and progress was to usurp its place. The "Company of Adventurers" that for two centuries had been the absolute lords and proprietors of this great domain of the west, and that had adventured little in the territory save the money which had earned it royal dividends, was to abrogate its privileges and waive its long claim to monopoly. The Hudson Bay traders had not even been called upon to pay the considertion which King Charles had stipulated should bind the bargain-viz., “two elks and two black beavers, whensoever and as often as we, our heirs and successors, shall happen to enter the said countries, territories, and regions." Verily, Prince Rupert had had a cousinly gift, and the descendants of the Prince and his associates have been royally dealt with.

But

# Ross gives the total population, in 1849, of the Red River Settlement, as 5391, housed in 745 dwellings. The area of cultivated land at the period, he states, was 6392 acres. He adds, in 1855, when his narrative went to press, that "there is no later census than the above; but the population of the colony this year is supposed to be about 6500 souls,"

the age was averse to monopolies; and when the interests of its equally favoured eastern rival had been assumed by the Crown, the great North-Western trading Company, however many and influential its advocates, could not long expect immunity from a like fate. The colony was now to yield to civilisation something more than beaver-skins and other products of the chase.

HE conflict between the past and the future, after these years of repression and strife, was now to be settled in favour of the coming time. The old was at last to give way to the new. In the unequal struggle with the advancing tide of civilisation, the Hudson Bay Company saw that it was finally to be worsted; and before the fate that impended was forced upon it, it discreetly endeavoured to secure terms upon which it might gracefully capitulate. While negotiations were pending, we can imagine with what feelings gouty old directors of the Company would meet at the London Board Room, in Fenchurch Street, and rail at the times being out of joint. How irately they would storm at the colonising spirit, and, in testy mood, splutter out expletives against the restless ambition of a young and progressive people! Yet, they were wise in their day and generation. They did not stand broom in hand, like Mrs. Partington, and hope successfully to sweep back the incoming tide of settlement, but allowed themselves to be borne shoreward to pick up on the beach the rich wreckage the ocean had spared them of their doomed argosy.

That the day was coming-had indeed now come—when the Company's rule was to cease, and the teeming life of the East was to be poured in upon the favoured plains of the West, the Company saw but too clearly; and seeing this, it made haste to set its house in order and make the best bargain possible. Already the voice of the colonists, petitioning the Canadian Parliament for relief from the tyranny of their situation, had been heard, and favourably heard, in England. As freemen they asked to be free. They asked for immunity from arbitrary arrest; from exorbitant imposts upon goods brought into the country; from the outrage of having their houses entered and effects confiscated at the caprice of a selfconstituted authority; and relief, generally, from a rule that had become obnoxious, and a tyranny that was now galling. Here is the concluding portion of the colonists' petition, after reciting the grievances of which they complained:

"The Council (called into existence by the Hudson Bay Company) imposes taxes, creates offences, and punishes the same by fines and imprisonment,-i.e., the Governor and Council make the laws, judge the laws, and execute their own sentence. We have no voice in their selection, neither have we any constitutional means of controlling their action. Under this system our energies are paralysed, and discontent is increasing to such a degree that events fatal to British interests, and particularly to the interests of Canada, and even to civilisation and humanity, may soon take place. When we contemplate the mighty tide of immigration which has flowed toward the north these six years past, and has already filled the valley of the Upper Mississippi with settlers, and which will this year flow over the height of land, and fill up the valley of Red River, is there no danger of being carried away by that flood, and that we may thereby lose our nationality? We love the British name! We are proud of that glorious fabric, the British Constitution. We have represented our grievances to the Imperial Government, but through the chicanery of the Company and its false representations, we