A General History of the Fur Trade. 



5 



But notwithstanding all the restrictions with which com- 

 merce was oppressed under the French government, the fur 

 trade was extended to the immense distance which has been 

 already stated; and surmounted many most discouraging 

 difficulties, which will be hereafter noticed ; while, at the 

 same time, no exertions were made from Hudson's Bay to 

 obtain even a share of the trade of a country which, accord- 

 ing to the charter of that company, belonged to it, and, 

 from its proximity, is so much more accessible to the mer- 

 cantile adventurer. 



Of these trading commanders, I understood, that two 

 attempted to penetrate to the Pacific Ocean, but the utmost 

 extent of their journey I could never learn; which maybe 

 attributed, indeed, to a failure of the undertaking. 



For some time after the conquest of Canada, this trade 

 was suspended, which must have been very advantageous to 

 the Hudson's Bay Company, as all the inhabitants to the 

 Westward of Lake Superior, were obliged to go to them 

 for such articles as their habitual use had rendered necessa- 

 ry. Some of the Canadians who had lived long with them, 

 and were become attached to a savage life, accompanied 

 them thither annually, till mercantile adventurers again ap- 

 peared from their own country, after an interval of several 

 years, owing, as I suppose, to an ignorance of the country in 

 the conquerors, and their want of commercial confidence 

 in the conquered. There were, indeed, other discourage- 

 ments, such as the immense length of the journey necessa- 

 ry to reach the limits beyond which this commerce must 

 begin ; the risk of property ; the expenses attending such 

 a long transport ; and an ignorance of the language of those 

 who, from their experience, must be necessarily employed 

 as the intermediate agents between them and the natives, 

 But, notwithstanding these difficulties, the trade, by de- 

 grees, began to spread over the different parts to which it 

 had been carried by the French, though at a great risk of 

 the lives, as well as the property, of their new possessors, 

 for the natives had been taught by their former allies to en- 

 tertain hostile dispositions towards the English, from their 

 having been in alliance with their natural enemies the Iro- 

 quois ; and there were not wanting a sufficient number of 

 discontented, disappointed people, to keep alive such a no- 

 tion ; so that for a long time they were considered and treat- 

 ed as objects of hostility. To prove this disposition of the 

 Indians, we have only to refer to the conduct of Pontiac, 



