444 THE ALASKAN BOUNDARY 



by Bancroft in his ' : History of Alaska " as a " powerful monop- 

 oly, firml) 7 " established in the favor of the imperial government, 

 many nobles of high rank and several members of the royal 

 family being among its shareholders." The correspondence 

 shows that the Russian negotiators were chiefly concerned to so 

 frame the treaty as to meet the wishes of the representatives of 

 this company, which was in intimate conference with them at 

 St Petersburg. 



The Hudson's Bay Company is so conspicuous a part of the 

 history of British North America that I need hardly refer to its 

 part in the government and development of that vast region of 

 our continent. At the date of the negotiations it had recently 

 absorbed its rival, the Northwest Company, and it was at the 

 height of its power and influence. It was the only representative 

 of British authority in all the region west and north of the prov- 

 ince of Ontario at that date and for several years after the middle 

 of the present century. The British negotiators of the treaty of 

 1825 were influenced almost entirely in their negotiations by 

 the views and interests of this company. Its representatives 

 were in constant communication with Secretary Canning by 

 personal interviews and by letters ; the boundary line which 

 they recommended was accepted and urged by the British gov- 

 ernment; and when negotiations were broken off they were not 

 resumed till this company was heard from, and its views were 

 again adopted and pressed.* It is safe to assert that no one 

 understood so well as the officials of these two companies the 

 territorial rights of their respective governments and subjects 

 secured by the treaty. 



A British vessel in the service of the Hudson's Bay Company, 

 the Dryad, reached the Russian post of Fort Wrangell, destined, 

 as it was alleged, for the British territory in the interior, at the 

 headwaters of the Stikine river. The vessel was detained and 

 not allowed to proceed on its voyage. The British government 

 protested to the Russian government and presented to it a large 

 claim for damages. The Russian government, being hard pressed 

 by the British minister, urged the Russian American Company 

 to come to some settlement with the Hudson's Bay Company, 

 and thereupon the governor of the latter, and one of the direct- 

 ors of the former company, with the express authorization of 

 the two governments, met at Hamburg in 1839. As a result of 

 their conferences the Russian American Company agreed to lease 



* Fur Seal Arbitration Papers, vol. iv, pp. 380, 383, 387, 417, 410, 421, 431. 



