"I think," said Mr. Radisson, "that the honourable adventurer does not understand the Indian trade as well as I do. He forgets that Indians are of many races; and that what will suit the case and attract the cupidity of an Indian far to the south, will have little effect on the northern tribes. An Iroquois would think more of a brass nail than of twenty yards of scarlet cloth. In the north, where we have built a factory, the Indians are more peaceful; but they do not care much for kickshaws and coloured rags. They, too, esteem powder and shot and the means of discharging them. But they are just as fond, particularly Eskimaux, of knives and kettles and hatchets."
On a subsequent occasion, a third as many again of these implements were taken as cargo.
Ships besieged by peddlers.
In the meantime, it was not to be supposed that the rumours of the great value put upon petty merchandise by the hyperborean savages, could fail to excite the cupidity of London merchants and dealers in these things. The ships that sailed in the spring of 1671 were besieged by peddlers and small dealers, who were prepared to adventure their property in the wilds. Not only the ships, but the houses selected for the Company's meetings were beset with eager throngs, praying the adventurers, collectively and individually, to act as middlemen for their trumpery merchandise.
Not only did the ships and the place of meeting suffer siege, but as many as thirty persons shipped out to Hudson's Bay in the first two voyages after the granting of the charter, while twenty-one of them returned in the next two vessels fully determined, apparently, to repeat a journey which had proved so lucrative.
To abate this nuisance, it was enacted that no persons would "hereafter be employed to stay in the country or otherwise but by consent of the Committee, nor any goods be put aboard the ships but with their knowledge and consent, to the end that the ships be not hereafter pestered as they were the last voyage."
This enactment may have had its rise in the dishonesty of these self-appointed adventurers. On several occasions on unshipping the cargo, boxes and barrels containing valuable furs would be found missing, or their loss would coincide with the disappearance of a reprobate who had joined the ship without a character.
Thus we read in the minutes that at one meeting it was ordered that enquiry be made as to sixty beaver skins, "very good and large, packed up with the others, in one of the casks, which were not found." One Jeremiah Walker, a second mate and supercargo was required to state which cask they were taken in, and his cross-examination reveals the loose and unbusiness-like methods then in vogue.
Nothing could be more entertaining than the character of these meetings, as compared with a modern board-meeting of a joint stock enterprise. A great air of mystery was kept up. The novelty of the undertaking was so great as to imbue the committee with a high sense of the importance and interest of their weekly conclaves. The length of the speeches bears witness to this spirit. A member had been known to speak for a whole hour on the edifying theme as to whether the furs should be placed in barrels or boxes.