14 HUNTERS OF THE GREAT NORTH 



pany's service. This was in the days when the Company 

 had not as yet traded away for money and for other 

 valuable considerations the right which they once had 

 actually to govern Canada, administering justice and hav- 

 ing even the power of life and death, not only over their 

 employees but over any one who penetrated the country 

 with or without their consent. Even alter these ancient 

 powers of the Hudson's Bay Company had been sur- 

 rendered, the tradition of exercising them still prevailed 

 and Anderson could never quite understand that any one 

 had a right to enter the north country without the con- 

 sent of the Company. I learned later that his attitude 

 towards all he met there was that of a generous and hos- 

 pitable host who, nevertheless, was much on his dignity, 

 ready to consider it an affront if anything was done with- 

 out his knowledge and approval. He knew his legal 

 rights of overlordship had been curtailed but he simply 

 could not bring himself to realize it. 



Many who knew Anderson liked him as I did; there 

 were many others who disliked and even hated him, and 

 chiefly because of his intense loyalty to the Company and 

 his inability to realize that "new occasions teach new 

 duties" and that "time makes ancient good uncouth." 



I made the journey with Anderson from Winnipeg to 

 Edmonton. In both cities and on the way between, his 

 hospitality was so insistent as to be embarrassing. When 

 once we passed beyond Edmonton this changed like the 

 switching on of a light of another color and he became 

 more penurious than can readily be imagined. This was 

 another of his traits which caused much misunderstanding 

 and ill feeling but which a few of us understood and sym- 

 pathized with. South of Edmonton he was a private 

 person, spending his own money as he liked; north of 



