1894-95.] THE FUR TRADE. 79" 



quarters they must, and always do, depend on the natives they 

 occasionally meet on the road for an additional supply, and when this 

 fails, which is sometimes the case, they are exposed to every misery that 

 it is possible to survive, and equally so in returning from the interior 

 country, as in the spring provisions are generally more scanty. In 

 winter quarters, however, they are at ease and commonly in plenty, which 

 can only reconcile them to that manner of life and make them forget 

 their sufferings in their annual voyage to and from the Grand Portage. 



"The property the Company have already in that country, exclusive of 

 their houses and stores and the different posts, as appears by the settle- 

 ment of their accounts this present year, amounts to the sum of ;^25,303,. 

 3s., 6d. currency, and their outfits for next spring, which will be sent 

 from Montreal as soon as the navigation opens, will not fall much short 

 of that sum, so that the Company will have an interest in July next of 

 about ;^5o,Ooo original cost in furs, to be sent to Montreal by the return 

 of their canoes, and in goods for the interior country, by which your 

 Excellency may judge of what may be expected from that trade when in 

 our power by an exclusive right for ten years to explore the country and 

 extend it." 



In a few months this was followed by a second memorial from Peter 

 Pond, who described himself as a partner in the Company, and who had 

 been actively engaged in the exploration of the North-west in pursuit of 

 trade for ten years. Pond declared that he had obtained positi\e infor- 

 mation from " natives who have lately been on the shores of North 

 Pacific Ocean," that the Russians had lately established a trading-station 

 there, and further that he was credibly informed that ships were being 

 fitted out in the United States under " the command of experienced sea- 

 men (who accompanied Captain Cook in his last voyage) in order to 

 establish a fur trade upon the north-west coast of America at or 

 near Prince William's Sound." P"rom the carefully drawn map which 

 accompanied his memorial, it appears that Pond had visited P'ort 

 Dauphin in 1775, and in 1776 and 1777 reached the site of the most 

 distant trading post established by the French upon the Upper Sas- 

 katchewan. From 1778 to 1784 he had wintered near the mouth of the 

 Athabasca. Frobisher traded near the ruins of Fort de Trait in 1774 and 

 wintered in 1777 on a peninsula at Clearwater Lake. 



On the 1st of August, 1785, James McGill formall\- annoiuiced the 

 discovery of the new route to the North-west, in a letter to Lieutenant- 

 Governor Hamilton. 



"A new road has been discovered from the Lake of or Nipigan, 



which runs to the N, of Wood Lakes and falls to the discharge of that 



