4: THE STORY OF THE TRAPPER 



bartering of pelts. But the bartering went on in a 

 prosy, half-alive way, the traders sitting snugly in 

 their forts on Kupert and Severn Kivers, or at York 

 Factory (Port Nelson) and Churchill (Prince of 

 Wales). The French governor down in Quebec issued 

 only a limited number of licenses for the fur trade 

 in Canada; and the old English company had no fear 

 of rivalry in the north. It never sought inland tribes, 

 but waited with serene apathy for the Indians to come 

 down to its fur posts on the bay. Young Le Moyne 

 d Iberville * might march overland from Quebec to the 

 bay, catch the English company nodding, scale the 

 stockades, capture its forts, batter down a wall or two, 

 and sail off like a pirate with ship-loads of booty for 

 Quebec. What did the ancient company care? Euro 

 pean treaties restored its forts, and the honourable ad 

 venturers presented a bill of damages to their govern 

 ment for lost furs. 



But came a sudden change. Great movements west 

 ward began simultaneously in all parts of the east. 



This resulted from two events England s victory 

 over France at Quebec, and the American colonies 

 Declaration of Independence. The downfall of French 

 ascendency in America meant an end to that license 

 system which limited the fur trade to favourites of 

 the governor. That threw an army of some two 

 thousand men voyageurs, coureurs des bois, mangeurs 



*1685- 87; the same Le Moyne d Iberville who died in 

 Havana after spending his strength trying to colonize the Mis 

 sissippi for France one instance which shows how completely 

 the influence of the fur trade connected every part of America, 

 from the Gulf to the pole, as in a network irrespective of 



