216 THE tri:aty of Washington. 



resolved itself into a mere commercial undertaking 

 for trade in the furs of the vast region in the space 

 between Canada or New France and the Arctic Sea, 

 inhabited only by wandering bands of Indians. 



Wlieu the great Succession War broke out, involv- 

 ing all Europe, it could not fail to reach America; 

 for the possessions of three of the four principal 

 Powers engaged, — France, Great Britain, and S2:>ain, 

 — occupied alternate points on the coast of the At- 

 lantic. The French, of course, endeavored to avail 

 themselves of the opportunity to drive out or to 

 weaken the English on both sides of them, and es- 

 pecially in Rupert's Land, which they invaded and 

 partly conquered, but restored by the subsequent 

 Treaty of Utrecht. 



After this time, the Company, safe in its arctic sol- 

 itudes, prospered without check for a century, filling 

 Rupert's Land -with forts and foctories, and engross- 

 in o; the fur trade of North America. 



Thereupon a rival Company entered the field, un- 

 der the auspices of the Province of Canada, founding 

 its enterprise on the assertion that Rupert's Land 

 had only a limited extension south and west, to cov- 

 er no more than the water-shed terminatino; at Hud- 

 son's Bay, with no rights or jurisdiction southward 

 and westward to the great Lakes and the Rocky 

 Mountains. 



After a long and violent controversy, the North- 

 west Fur Company was by agreement of parties 

 merged to the Hudson's Bay Company. 



iThe combined influence of the parties interested in 



