No. 3.] G. M. DAWSON — INDIANS OF CANADA. 153 



In 1858 attention was prominently called to British Columbia, 

 owing to the discovery of gold, and the rush of miners from all 

 quarters, and, accordingly, we find next among the papers (dated 

 in July of that year) an extract from a despatch of Lord Lytton, 

 as Secretary of State for the Colonies, to Douglas, then appointed 

 Governor of the region, recommending kind treatment of the 

 natives, and ordering that in all cases of cession of land, subsis- 

 tence, in some form, should be granted to them. In September 

 of the same year, there is a second despatch from Lytton, enclos- 

 ing a memorial from the Aborigines Protection Society, which 

 gives reasons for fearing that, the miners then flocking to the 

 country, the Indians would be harshly treated, and advising, 

 justly, that the native right to the soil should be recognized. In 

 venturing to point out means of satisfying the natives, however, 

 the Society makes various suggestions, some of which, to any one 

 acquainted with the circumstances of the country, look sufficiently 

 absurd. It is said, for instance : — " To accomplish the difficult 

 but necessary task of civilizing the Indians, and of making them 

 our trusty friends and allies, it would seem to be indispensable 

 to employ in the various departments of government a large pro- 

 portion of well selected men more or less of Indian blood (many 

 of whom could be found at the Red River) ! who might not 

 only exert a greater moral influence over their race than we could 

 possibly do, but whose recognized position among the whites 

 should be some guarantee that the promised equality of races 

 should be realized." Red River being in actual distance and in 

 manners as remote from Victoria as is St. Petersburg from Lon- 

 don, this part of the scheme is, to say the least of it, visionary. 



Next follows some additional corresp ndence between Governor 

 Douglas and the Colonial Office in 1858-59, of a similar tenor, 

 in which both parties agree in the advisability of endeavouring 

 to locate the Indians in their villages, and render them self-sup- 

 porting. Douglas, however, instanced as specially to be avoided, 

 the method originally pursued by the Spanish Catholic mission- 

 aries to California, where the Indians, though fed, clothed, and 

 taught to labour, were kept in a state of dependence, not allowed 

 to think, act, or acquire property for themselves, and when freed 

 from control were without self reliance, more helpless and degra- 

 ded than at first. Also, that since pursued toward the same 

 Indians by the x\merican Congress, of supporting them at great 

 cost by the State, the natives nevertheless rapidly degenerating. 



