272 THE FUR TRADE OF AMERICA 



same tribe improved in standard of living under Hudson's Bay 

 rule. Recently a well-known Canadian governor making an 

 itinerary of the territory round the bay found the Indians such 

 devout Christians that they put his white retinue to shame. Re- 

 turning to civilization, the governor was observed attending the 

 services of his own denomination with a greater fury than was his 

 wont. Asked the reason, he confided to a club friend that he would 

 be blanked if he could allow heathen Indians to be better Christians 

 than he was. 



Some of the shiftless Indians may be hopelessly in debt to the 

 company for advanced provisions, but if the company had not 

 made these advances the Indians would have starved, and the 

 debt is never exacted by seizure of the hunt that should go to feed 

 a family. 



Of how many other creditors may that be said ? Of how many 

 companies that it has cared for the sick, sought the lost, fed the 

 starving, housed the homeless ? With all its faults, that is the 

 record of the Hudson's Bay Company. 1 



1 The summer of 1920 saw many of the abuses of the old fights of a hundred years ago 

 repeated. This was owing to the intrusion of drunken gamblers in a new game as told in 

 Part I. Whiskey played the usual part. Indians, resisting the debauchery of whole tribes, 

 did not commit murders ; for the mounted police arrest murderers ; but they did destroy 

 caches; so the returning buyer coming back on his trail would perish of starvation. Fortu- 

 nately, the collapse of the gamblers' intrusion on the fur trade has driven these gentry out, . 

 ruined. Prices on poor furs collapsed. The bubble of " busting the old companies " has 

 brought its own punishment in no sales for poor furs; and the banks are selling seized furs 

 in foreclosed lien mortgages. 



