SOURCE OF ST. PETEr's RIVER. 67 



about fifty years since, it was a place of great resort both 

 for English and French traders. At that time, or soon after, 

 there were six opposition companies, which after a while 

 dwindled into the famous North-west Company, one of 

 the most active and enterprising trading associations that 

 was ever created. The trade was then extremely profita- 

 ble ; in one season, a trader might almost realize a fortune. 

 As an instance of what it was even eighteen years ago, we 

 may mention, that Desmarais, the man who guided our ca- 

 noes from Fort Douglas to Lake Superior, purchased at 

 one time from an Indian, two packs of beaver skins, 

 containing about one hundred and twenty skins, and weigh- 

 ing about one hundred and eighty pounds, for which he 

 gave two, (three point,) blankets, eight quarts of his best 

 rum, and a pocket looking-glass. These goods were rated 

 by the company at thirty dollars, but had probably not 

 cost fifteen. The beavers sold in Montreal for up- 

 wards of four hundred dollars ; this was considered fair 

 dealing with the Indians. 



The first colony was planted in the year 1S12, when Miles 

 Macdonell, who was appointed its governor, built a fort on 

 Red river. The colony throve indifferently well, but quar- 

 rels broke out between the colonists and the North-west 

 Company's servants. We have no wish to enter into parti- 

 culars on the subject of this unfortunate division ; suffice it to 

 say, that a disunion, founded upon commercial rivalry, had 

 for along time previous existed between the Hudson's Bay 

 and the North-west Companies ; the colony was considered 

 by the latter as planted for the purpose of strengthening the 

 interest of the former. Fears were expressed that the esta- 

 blishment of the colony would prove ruinous to their com- 

 mercial transactions, as agriculture and a fur trade cannot 

 flourish in the same country. Apprehensions were like- 



