A. D. 1670. 557 



ceflion of the crown, had not limited the prerogative in the cafe of ex- 

 elufive charters of privileges, this company would doubtlefs be abfolute 

 in thofe immenfe territories : but the cafe, to our great happinefs, is 

 now quite otherwife ; and fince that great eftabliihment of our liber- 

 ties, neither the HudTon's-bay, nor any other company, not confirmed 

 by act of parliament, has any exclufive rights at all : wherefor any Bri- 

 lifli fubjecls may fail into Hudlon's bay, fifli, and traffic with the na- 

 tive Indians there, may travel into, and make difcoveries therein, either 

 by land or water, as freely as that company can do, as has fince been 

 praftifed frequently in our own days. All the advantage, that the com- 

 pany has over other adventurers thither, is purely the benefit of their 

 own forts, fuch as they are, whereby their agents can refide in fo in- 

 hofpitable a country during the winter, pre})aratory to their trading 

 with the favages againfi; the arrival ot their fliips in the fummer ; and 

 that thereby they have not only more fafety and protection , but alio 

 have m.ore experience in trading with the native Indians thereabout 

 than any private adventurers can have, whofe fliips cannot with fafety 

 remain in that vail bay above a part only ot our lummer, left they be 

 fhut in by the ice, which fills the bay with heaps of it iike mountams. 

 And indeed, even thefe advantages alone on the company's lide are fo 

 confiderable, that they are not like to be fuccelsfuUy rivalled m hafte 

 by any private adventurers. Their capital of about Lii 0,000, is con- 

 fined to a fmall nuniber of proprietors, who have three or four forts m 

 different parts of Hudlon's bay, in which they have in all about i 20 

 perfons, who, for nine months of the year, live in a manner ftiut up 

 within their forts, in low hdules calculated to defend them from the 

 piercing cold, fnow, and rains. In lummer they go out and fhoot, hunt, 

 and fifli, and meet with deer and wild-fowl ; and they have lome few 

 wild fruits, as ftrawberries, dewberries, and gool'eberrics. From Eng- 

 land they receive annually three or foui Ihips laden with coarfe woollen 

 goods, guns, powder and ihot, I'pirits, edge-tools, and fundry other uten- 

 fils : in return for which the natives fell them all kinds of furs or pel- 

 try, goofe quills, caflorum, wdiale fins and oil, bed feathers, &c. and 

 they make handforae annual dividends to their proprietors. 



' Mr. Eailey, the company's firft governor of tiieir fictories and fet- 

 ' tlements in that bay, entertained a friendly correfpondence, by letters 

 ' and otherwile, with Mr. Frontenac then governor ot Canaua, who, in 

 ' feveral years, made no complamt of any injury done to f ranee by 

 ' the company's fettling a trade and building iorts m Hudlon's bay, 

 ' nor did France pretend any right to that bay, or to tlie countries bor- 

 ' dering on it, till long after this time,' as will be leen in its place. 



The country around Hudlbn'ii bay is Jo inhofpitable, that even in the 

 nioft foutherly part of the bay, in the latitude of but 51 degrees, it is 

 exceffively cold for about nine Uiondis of the year. In fo wretched a. 



