REVIEWS— RED RIVER AND ASSINIBOINE EXPLORATIONS. 177 
actually paid up of between 60 and 170 per cent. per annum from the year 1690 
to 1800, or during a period of 110 years. 
_ Up to this time the Hudson’s Bay Company enjoyed a monopoly of the fur 
trade, and reaped a rich harvest of wealth and influence. 
In 1783 the North-West Company was formed, having its head-quarters at 
Montreal. The North-West Company soon rose to the position of a formidable 
rival to the Hudson’s Bay Company, and the territory the two companies traded 
in became the scene of animosities, feuds, and bloodshed, involving the destruction 
of property, the demoralization of the Indians, and the ruin of the fur trade. 
Owing to this opposition, the interest of the Hudson’s Bay Company suffered to 
such an extent, that between 1800 and 1821, a period of twenty-two years, their 
dividends were, for the first eight years, reduced to four per cent., during the next 
six years they could pay no dividend at all, and for the remaining eight years 
they could pay only four per cent. 
In the year 1821 a union between the North-West and Hudson’s Bay Companies 
took place, under the title of the last named. The proprietary were called upon 
to pay £100 per cent. upon their capital, which, with the stock in trade of both 
parties in the country, formed a capital stock of £400,000, on which four per 
cent. dividend was paid in the years 1821 to 1824, and from that time half yearly 
dividends of five per cent. to 1828, from 1828 to 1832 a dividend of five per cent. 
with a bonus of ten per cent. was paid, and from 1832 to 1837 a dividend of five 
per cent., with an average bonus of six percent. The distribution of profits to 
the shareholders for the years 1847 to 1856, both inclusive, was as follows :— 
1847—1849, ten per cent. per annum; 1850, twenty per cent. per annum, of 
which ten per cent. was added to stock; 1851, ten per cent. ; 1852, fifteen per 
eent., of which five per cent. was added to stock; 1853, £18 4s. 6d., of which 
£8 4s. 6d. was added to stock ; 1854 to 1856, ten per cent. per annum dividend. 
Of 268 proprietors in July 1856, 196 have purchased their stock at from 220 to 
240 per cent. 
The affairs of the Hudson’s Bay Company are managed by a Governor-in-chief, 
sixteen chief factors, twenty-nine chief traders, five surgeons, eighty-seven clerks, 
sixty-seven post masters, twelve hundred permanent servants, and five hundred 
voyageurs, besides temporary employés of different ranks, chiefly consisting of 
voyageurs and servants. The total number of persons in the employ of the Hud- 
son’s Bay Company is about 3000. 
Sir George Simpson has been Governor of the Hudson’s Bay Company for forty 
years. He exercises a general supervision over the Company’s affairs, presides at 
their councils in the country, and has the principal direction of the whole interior 
management in North America.* The Governor is assisted by a council for each 
of the two departments into which the territory is divided. 
The seat of council for the Northern department is at Norway House, on Lake 
Winnipeg; for the southern department at Michipicoten, Lake Superior, or 
Moose Factory, on James’s Bay. 
* Before the volumes reached Canada death had deprived the Company of their long-tried 
and efficient Governor. 
