yet indispensable; and that the Indians be liberally supplied with requisite necessaries, particularly with articles of ammunition, whether they have the means of paying for it or not.' It is equally the Company's inclination and their interest to render the natives comfortable. It is when they are well clothed, and amply provided with ammunition, that they are best able to exert themselves in collecting furs and provisions. But, so far is it from the Company's wish to acquire an undue influence over them, by loading them with debts, that repeated attempts have been made to reduce the trade to a simple barter. In order to effect an object so beneficial to the natives themselves, the arrears of the Chipewyans have been twice cancelled since the junction of the two companies in 1821; but the generous experiment has signally failed. The improvidence of the Indian character is an insurmountable obstacle to its success, and, in the Chipewyans, is aggravated by a custom which the whites have not yet been able wholly to eradicate. On the death of a relative, they destroy guns, blankets, kettles, everything, in short, they possess, concluding the havoc by tearing their lodges to pieces. When these transports of grief have subsided, they must have recourse to the nearest establishment for a fresh supply of necessaries; and thus their debts are renewed. The debts of the deceased are, in every case, lost to the Company. The Indian debt system is, in reality, equivalent to the practice, in many civilized countries, of making advances to hired servants previous to the commencement of their actual duties. This is particularly remarkable among the French Canadians, who can scarcely be induced to undertake any work or service without first receiving part payment in advance. Their improvidence approaches to that of the Indian, and produces similar effects.'-(Pp. 72-75.)

The treatment of the Indians on the west coast, is shown by the Rev. Samuel Parker, a Minister of the Gospel in the United States, who was sent by the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions to ascertain the field for missionary enterprise beyond the Rocky Mountains, in 1836-7. The reverend gentleman takes occasion in various places to express his highest commendation of the policy

and proceedings of the Hudson's Bay Company. At page 31 of his interesting Journal, he says: The gentlemen belonging to the Hudson's Bay Company deserve commendation for their gentle treatment of the Indians, by which they have obtained their friendship and confidence, and also for the efforts which some few of them have made to instruct those about them in the first principles of our holy religion, especially in regard to equity, humanity, and morality. This Company is of long standing; they have originated a vast trade, which they are anxious to preserve, and therefore they consult the prosperity of the Indians, as intimately connected with their own. I have not been informed, as yet, of a single instance of any Indian being wantonly killed by the men belonging to this Company; nor have I heard any boasting among them of the satisfaction taken in killing or abusing Indians, too frequently observable elsewhere.' Indeed it is so obviously the interest of a powerful body like the Hudson's Bay Company, who are not grasping at an immediate individual advantage, who feel they are responsible to their Sovereign and the Nation for the righteous fulfilment of the trust reposed in them, and who, it is to be presumed, have Christian consciences as well as other men, that it is scarcely necessary to multiply evidence on the subject; but, as it is now proposed to entrust to this Company the colonization of Vancouver's Island, it is desirable to examine their past proceedings in every respect.

Mr. Simpson, speaking of his wintering at Fort Chipewyan, in 1837, says: The month of February was unusually mild, and at noon the sun not unfrequently asserted his increasing power by a gentle thaw. Messengers were continually arriving with favourable accounts from the Indian camps; a pleasing contrast to the preceding winter, which is rendered memorable to the poor natives by the ravages of an influenza-scarcely less dreadful than the cholera -that carried off nearly 200 of the distant Chipewyans. I say distant, because all who were within reach of the establishment were sent for and carried thither, where every care was taken of them; warm clothing and lodgings were provided; medicines administered; the traders and servants fed them, parting with their own slender

stock of luxuries* for their nourishment; till even the cold heart of the red man warmed into gratitude, and his lips uttered the unwonted accents of thanks.'-(Pp. 67, 68.) And again—' It is with sincere pleasure I take this occasion of observing, that the harsh treatment of their women, for which the Chipewyans were, not long since, remarkable, even among the North American tribes, is now greatly alleviated, especially among those who have frequent communication with the establishments. At Great Bear Lake I had many opportunities of witnessing the conduct of this particular family, and always saw the females treated with kindness. The present Chipewyan character, indeed, contrasts most favourably with that of the party who accompanied Hearne on his discovery of the Copper Mine River, and who massacred the unhappy Esquimaux, surprised asleep in their tents at the Bloody Fall. A large proportion of the Company's servants, and, with very few exceptions, the officers, are united to native women. A kindly feeling of relationship thus exists. between them and the Indians, which tends much to the safety of the small and thinly scattered posts, placed, as they are, among overwhelming numbers, were those numbers hostile. The rising class of officers have begun to marry the young ladies educated at Red River, which will tend to give a higher tone to the manners and morals of the country, without, it is to be hoped, diminishing those mutual feelings of goodwill that now subsist between the Indians and the traders resident among them.

'An aged Cree hunter arrived with his family. Feeling his strength, which had borne him through forest and flood for many a year, no longer equal to the chase, the old man said that he was come to end his days at the fort. With care and attention, however, he soon began to revive; the whole family were furnished with everything necessary, had the same rations assigned them as the

A few pounds of tea, sugar, &c., allowed to officers and guides, and purchased by the common men, are called luxuries' in Hudson's Bay. The old Canadian voyageurs' who lament the degeneracy of their successors, are nothing loth to imitate their example in adding these comforts to their fare; and an encampment of the present day exhibits a regular assortment of tea kettles, pots, and pans.'

regular servants, and continued to live in comfort at the establishment. Many other Indians came in from the different camps with furs and for supplies.

'From some of the Chipewyans I learned that they had, in the course of the preceding summer, met with a party of Esquimaux at the confluence of the noble Thelew or Thelon River with the Doobaunt of Hearne, below the lake of the latter name, and not far from the influx of these united streams into Chesterfield Inlet. This meeting was of the most amicable character, and they spent a great part of the summer together. The Esquimaux even proposed to send two of their young men to Athabasca, inviting the same number of Indians to pass the winter with them. The arrangement was agreed to by both parties, but was frustrated by some petty jealousy among the women. They also informed me that, in 1832, some of the Athabasca Chipewyans accompanied the Churchill branch of their tribe on their annual meeting with other Esquimaux at Yath Kyed, or White Snow Lake of Hearne, which receives the united waters of the Cathawchaga and the rapid Kasan, or White Partridge River. This remarkable change, from mortal hatred to frank and confident intercourse, is solely owing to the humane interposition of the Company's officers, who neglect no opportunity of inculcating on the minds of these savage tribes the propriety of their forgiving ancient wrongs, and uniting together in the bonds of peace and friendship. By the same influence, the warlike Beaver Indians of Peace River have been, of late years, reconciled to their old enemies, the Thocanies of the Rocky Mountains, and the Carriers of New Caledonia.'-(Narrative, &c., pp. 69-72.)

Wherever, indeed, the Hudson's Bay Company have established settlements or forts (as their stockades are called), they have made a nucleus for civilization, which gradually spreads around.

Governor Simpson, in an able résumé of the proceedings of the Hudson's Bay Company, dated 1st February, 1837, printed in the Parliamentary Papers of 8th August, 1842, p. 17, says: I have no hesitation in saying, that the native population of the countries through which the Hudson's Bay Company's business extends never

derived any real benefit from their intercourse with the whites until the fur trade became exercised under the existing licence. In proof of this, the population of some of the tribes, previous to that time sensibly diminishing, is now increasing; and from my experience of the times of opposition, I can further say, that if the trade were again thrown open to competition, all the horrors of the late contest would break out afresh; drunkenness and demoralization would have their former sway, not only among the natives, but among the whites, whom we are now enabled to keep under proper subordination, which was never the case during the excitement occasioned by the rivalship in trade; the fur-bearing animals would in the course of a very few years become nearly extinct; and the inevitable consequences would be the desertion of the natives by the traders, the latter having no longer any inducement to remain among them; that unfortunate population, thus left to their own resources, must inevitably perish from cold and hunger,-the use of the bow and arrow, and other rude inplements, formerly affording them the means of feeding and clothing themselves, being now unknown, and our guns, ammunition, fishing-tackle, iron works, cloth, blankets, and other manufactures having become absolutely necessary to their very existence. [For confirmation, see p. 84.]

Previous to 1821 the business of the Columbia department was very limited; but it has since been very greatly extended at much expense, and, I am sorry to add, at a considerable sacrifice of life among the Company's officers and servants, owing to the fierce, treacherous, and bloodthirsty character of its population, and the dangers of the navigation.

The fur trade is the principal branch of business at present in the country situated between the Rocky Mountains and the Pacific Ocean. On the banks of the Columbia River, however, where the soil and climate are favourable to cultivation, we are directing our attention to agriculture on a large scale, and there is every prospect that we shall soon be able to establish important branches of export trade from thence in the articles of wool, tallow, hides, tobacco, and grain of various kinds.