many a harsh experience, and the free revel of animal spirits gave a zest to perils and hardships. It is to be frankly admitted that all the young, and with scarcely a single exception the older writers, who have given their experience in the service of the Bay Company, have bitterly complained of its dealings with them as mean and tyrannical.1 It does not appear that in any case either the foreign or the local administrators of the affairs of the company concerned themselves with replying to these assaults, or attempted to visit any penalty upon the authors. All its servants, and the youngest of them most rigidly, were held to the sole obligation of advancing the interests of the company in its giant monopoly, and in enabling it to return its fabulous dividends to its stockholders. The two main inspirations for courage, endurance, and business integrity which animated the young apprentice and cheered him in his lonely post were the prospect of promotion, in the method favored though not always pursued by the company, to the coveted positions of chief trader and chief factor, after fifteen, twenty, or more years of service as a clerk, and the crowning of his one hope of being able to return as a man of substance and spend his leisure days in his early home. Of course there was always a fluttering of spirits in these subordinates when the annual council at Norway or York post was making its deal of assignments and positions. The few rather than the many found reason to be content with the unalterable allotments, and there was nothing to be done but to resume the routine of tasks. As to the other alleviation found in the hope and purpose of a homeward return with the rewards of a competency, it is safe to say that in a large majority of cases the intent had weakened and lost its attractions when it might have been realized. The cases, indeed, were exceptional in which those who had lived many years in the service of the Bay Company returned to the old civilized scenes and ways. With the marvellous potency of the needful adaptations and habits of wholly new and strange ways of life in its vigorous period, to substitute a second nature for that in which one was born and early trained, the round of experience and the companionship in the wilderness had a strangely fascinating influence. To endure existence under its necessary conditions, it was essential to make the most and the best of them. And exactly as one became conformed to them there grew upon him a preference for them. The voracious appetite acquired by rough exposure gave to wilderness viands and cookery a quality of luxury. One who was used to having the whole air of heaven to breathe, and the whole hemisphere as a canopy for his couch, whose toilet was of the simplest, and who was wonted to the freedom of the forests and the rivers, gradually lost his fitness and his tolerance for the conventionalities, the fashions, and the appliances of artificial life. Family relationships formed in the wilderness, with partners of pure or mingled blood, while they may have generally been loose and readily disposed of, were not infrequently comfortably and faithfully sustained for life. Occasionally the children of such a parentage were sent to Canada or England for education. In the mean while the long years of forest life which had resulted in this transforming process for the Scotch youth had wrought their changes in the scenes and generations of his early home. He did not care to see it 1 "The history of my career may serve as a warning to those who may be disposed to enter the Hudson's Bay Company's service. They may learn that from the moment they embark in the company's canoes at Lachine, or in their ships at Gravesend, they bid adieu to all that civilized man most values on earth. They bid adieu to their family and friends, probably forever; for if they should remain long enough to attain the promotion that allows them the privilege of revisiting their native land — a period of from twenty to twenty-five years what changes does not this life exhibit in a much shorter time? They bid adieu to all the comforts and conven iences of civilized life, to vegetate at some deso- again. When, as we shall note, an agricultural settlement was made within the territory of the company, many of its servants and officers retired with a competency, and found congenial homes where a forest tramp, hunting and fishing expeditions, and converse with successors in their old occupations led them to the natural close of their * career. The names given to some of the most distant and dreary of the northern posts of the company, on Mackenzie's River and the Great Slave Lake, seemed to have been intended to keep up the spirits of their occupants. Thus we have "Providence," "Reliance," Resolution," "Enterprise," "Good Hope," and "Confidence." The narrations of the modes of travel and intercourse by which these and other widely separated posts were reached, their supplies furnished, and the returns gathered from and to the shipping points in the bay, were the first matters of interest for the apprentices, and are given with charming fullness of detail and incident in their journals. The admirable facilities for transit furnished by the water-ways of lake and river were availed of alike by the natives and the Europeans, and were best improved when they were in company. The ascent of a river to the lake from which it flowed, the skirting of that lake till it led to another river which discharged into it, with the interspersion of carrying-places, gave variety to the route. Conspicuous, and among the earliest of these descriptive books,1 is Arthur Dobbs's Account of the Countries adjoining to Hudson's Bay, in the Northwest Part of America, etc. (London, 1744),2 which was written in very earnest support of the probability of a northwest passage, and in advocacy of renewed efforts to search for it. Parliament had offered a reward of £20,000 to whoever might discover it. Mr. Dobbs's work was of importance, because the grievances of which he and his associates in a voyage of discovery complained, and the charges brought by them against the obstructing influence of the Hudson Bay Company, were the grounds of a petition to the Lords in Council, in 1749, against its monopoly. The petitioners insist that the company's charter was either from 1 [One of our sources for earlier glimpses of the Hudson Bay region are the missionary accounts in such collections as the Lettres Ecrites des Missions Etrangères (1650-1750, in 47 vols.). There is a selection in Kip's Hist. Scenes from the old Jesuit Missions, and particularly in his Early Jesuit Missions in North America. The early geographical history of Hudson's Bay is traced ante, Vol. III. On early complaints by the company of French encroachments, see Brymner's Report on the Dominion Archives, 1883, extracting from vol. 96 of the Plantations General of the Public Record Office in London. - ED.] 2 [The title of the book is much longer (cf. Pilling's Eskimo Bibliog., p. 23). The book includes an abstract of the journal of Capt. Christopher Middleton, who commanded the "Furnace,' ," "with observations on his behavior "dur. ing this voyage for the discovery of a passage to the South Seas. In these Middleton was charged with a collusion with the Hudson Bay Company to prevent any successful efforts to effect such a discovery. This led to a pamphlet war. Middleton published a Vindication of his Conduct (Dublin, 1744), in which he gave his instructions, with as much of the log journal as relates to the discovery." Dobbs then published Remarks upon Capt. Middleton's Defence (London, 1744), in which he says that there is the "highest probability that there is such a passage as he went in search of." Middleton printed A Reply to the Remarks (London, 1744), and again Forgery Detected (London, 1745). Dobbs responded in A Reply to Capt. Middleton's Answer to the Remarks (London, 1745), in which he charges Middleton with laying down false currents, tides, straits, and rivers in his chart and journal to conceal the discovery; and appends a specific answer to his Forgery Detected. The captain closed the warfare with a Rejoinder (London, 1745). All these titles are given at length in Carter-Brown, iii. (in this order), nos. 766, 774, 767, 775, 798, 803, 804. This old controversy has been summarized in John Barrow's introduction to The geography of Hudson's Bay: the remarks of William Coats in voyages between 1727 and 1751. With appendix containing the log of Capt. Middleton on his voyage for the discovery of the north-west passage, 1741-2 (London: Hakluyt Society, 1852), in which that editor holds that subsequent explorations have proved Middleton's representations to be correct, and that his correspondence preserved at the Admiralty makes clear Middleton's straightforwardness. - ED.] the first invalid, or is forfeited by the way in which it has been used to obstruct the very objects it was intended to advance. They ask for an incorporation giving them similar rights over the region adjacent to that granted to the company for the purpose of advancing discovery and trade. As has been said in the previous pages, this, like all the other public impeachments of the company, failed of its object.1 The following extract will show the frankness and force of Mr. Dobbs's charges: "The reason why the manner of living there at present appears to be so dismal to us in Britain is entirely owing to the monopoly and avarice of the Hudson's Bay Company (not to give it a harsher name), who, to deter others from trading there or making settlements, conceal all the advantages to be made in that country, and give out that the climate and country and passage thither are much worse and more dangerous than they really are, and vastly worse than might be, if those seas were more frequented, and proper settlements and improvements were made, and proper situations chosen for that purpose; this they do that they may engross a beneficial trade to themselves, and therefore oblige their captains not to make any charts or journals that may discover those seas or coasts, in order to prevent others from sailing to their factories. They also prevent their servants from giving any account of the climate or countries adjacent, that might be favorable, and induce others to trade and settle there; nor do they encourage their servants, or even allow them, to make any improvements without their factories, unless it be a turnip garden; confining them all the summer season, during the time of the Indian trade, within their factories, lest they should trade by stealth with the natives," etc. (pp. 2 and 3). Mr. Dobbs makes public many interesting particulars concerning the zeal and prosperity of the French in the fur trade, as far surpassing and encroaching upon those of the company. He derived his information from Joseph la France, “a French Canadese Indian, who for more than thirty years had traversed the region of the lakes, and had tramped to York Fort." 2 We may appreciate the interest and influence which the monopolizing company could bring to bear in resisting the force of these numerous and severe complaints against it, so far as to retain its charter. A popular book in its day was Henry Ellis's Voyage to Hudson's Bay, by the Dobbs Galley and California, in the years 1746 and 1747, for discovering a Northwest Passage, etc. (London, 1748). The very intelligent, able, and candid author of this volume was an earnest believer in the existence of and the possibility of opening the way to a northwestern water route through America to India. He tells us that he happened to return to England from Italy only four days before the actual sailing of two vessels, lying in the Thames, which had been provided by a company of subscribers to go on the search. So ardent was his zeal and so strong the interest which he made with the proprietors, that only a few hours before the departure he was allowed to embark in an office of trust and honor. He devotes a hundred pages of his volume to a résumé of the history of all previous voyages in the attempts to find the desired passage. He then gives an admi 1 Cf. A short narrative and justification of the Proceedings of the Committee appointed by the adventurers to prosecute the discovery of the passage to the Western Ocean of America, and to open and extend the trade and settle the countries beyond Hudson's Bay, with an apology for their postponing at present their intended application to Parliament (London, 1749); and A Short State of the Countries and Trade of North America claimed by the Hudson's Bay Company, under pretence of a charter (London, 1749). See other tracts named in the Carter-Brown Catalogue, nos. 914-15. 2 [Dobbs's map is entitled: A new map of part of North America, including the late discoveries made on board the Furnace Bomb Ketch in 1742, and the western rivers and lakes falling into Nelson's River in Hudson's Bay, as described by Joseph La France, a French Canadese Indian, who traveled through those countries and lakes for three years, from 1737 to 1740. It gives a conjectural unknown coast from Cape Blanco (California) to the northwest cor ner of Hudson's Bay. Cf. on the relations of the French to the fur trade, 1524-1763, H. H. Bancroft's Northwest Coast, i. 378, 395, 404, 437, 482, 504, 535, 541, 547, 591. — ED.] - rable sketch from a carefully prepared journal of his own expedition, which, though it failed of its object, did not in the least impair his confidence in it or his belief that it would ultimately be realized. His party, with the two vessels, wintered in Hayes River, near York Fort. It is in connection with this incident that the author, in a spirit of great frankness and with the statement of discreditable facts, though in carefully measured terms and language, arraigns the conduct of the agent of the Hudson Bay Company at the fort for truculency and hostility, as having no interest in, but rather opposing the designs of Mr. Ellis's expedition, notwithstanding its high patronage. He very fairly raises the question, whether the company should retain a charter privilege granted in the interest of discovery, if there is reason for regarding such discovery as hopeless, or if efforts in its behalf are to be withstood. The commander of the fort stoutly opposed the anchoring of the vessels anywhere in proximity. He then tried to compel their lying below the fort, open to the sea, where they would have been knocked to pieces. When he found the officers were determined to anchor in Hayes River, he forbade his Indian servants to furnish them with fresh provisions during their fearful winter sufferings with scurvy. Joseph Robson, who had been surveyor and supervisor of the buildings of the company, offered a very severe arraignment of its narrow measures and selfishness in an Account of Six Years' Residence in Hudson's Bay, from 1733 to 1736 and 1744 to 1747, containing a variety of Facts, Observations, and Discoveries, etc. (London, 1752).1 The author shows that positive obstructions, bugbears, and prohibitions were used to prevent all efforts for penetrating into the country and using the facilities of the waterways. He himself made such efforts, notwithstanding strong opposition. He addresses himself to the Earl of Halifax, of the Commissioners of Trade and Plantations, urging the vast importance to Great Britain of breaking a rigid monopoly, and of offering national encouragement in laying open the trade to rich territories and keeping them out of the hands of the French. He reminds the earl that, in view of these vast interests, a petition had gone to Parliament in 1749 from the chief trading cities and towns in Great Britain against the company's charter. He himself was one of those who were called to give testimony in the hearing. The company brought in defence only garbled extracts from documents and papers. He says the French have won great prizes from the sluggishness of the company. "The company have for eighty years slept at the edge of a frozen sea they have shown no curiosity to penetrate farther themselves, and have exerted all their art and power to crush that spirit in others." They have prevented all friendly intercourse with the natives, and the acquisition of their language. They have discouraged all use of the rich fisheries, all mining enterprises, and all projects for settling colonies. The annual export is of less than £5,000, in but three or four vessels, under two hundred tons each. Four small factories and two small houses, served by one hundred and fifty men, stand at the mouths of frozen rivers, with temperate and fruitful countries, south of them, neglected. The Indians are left in the rudest barbarity. In an appendix to the volume is an account of the discovery of the bay and the proceedings of the British there. It was in 1769-1772 that Samuel Hearne made his explorations for the company, but his narrative was not published till twenty years later, as a Journey from Prince of Wales Fort to the Northern Ocean (London, 1795; Dublin, 1796); and then, by its denial of any motive and act of the company to check exploration, it served as an offset to the most severe criticism which came from any one who had been in the company's service, and which appears in Edward Umfreville's Present State of Hudson's Bay, containing a full description of that settlement, etc. (London, 1790). He had been for eleven years in the company's service and for four years in the Canada fur trade, and he finds grounds in his own observation and experience for grave censures upon it. Yet he does not write as from personal vindictiveness or with any asperity. He addresses himself to the mer 1 Carter-Brown Catalogue, iii. no. 986. |