Canada and Newfoundland

by Frank G. Carpenter

A trader had to be a diplomat to preserve friendly relations with the Indians, an administrator to manage the Company’s valuable properties in his charge, a shrewd bargainer to dispose of his stock on good terms, and at times soldier and explorer besides. The Company’s charter authorized it to apply the laws of England in the territories under its jurisdiction, and its agents frequently had to administer justice with a stern hand. It early became the inflexible policy to seek out a horse thief, incendiary, or murderer among the Indians and impose punishment, and it was the trader who had to catch his man and sometimes to execute him.

It was the activities of its rivals, and especially of the Northwest Company, that resulted in the establishment of the inland stations of the Hudson’s Bay Company. As long as it had a monopoly, the Company was content to set up posts at points convenient for itself, and let the Indians do all the travelling, sometimes making them go as much as one thousand miles to dispose of their furs. The opposition, however, carried goods to the Indians, and thus penetrated to the far Northwest and the Mackenzie River country. This competition compelled the older organization to extend its posts all over Canada, and finally, in 1821, led to its absorption of the Northwest Company. To-day the chief competitor of the Hudson’s Bay Company is the French firm of Revillon Frères.

The merger with the Northwest Company was preceded by years of violent struggle. The younger concern was the more aggressive. It tried to keep the Indians from selling furs to the Hudson’s Bay traders. Its men destroyed the traps and fish nets, and stole the weapons, ammunition, and furs of their rivals. Neither was above almost any method of tricking the other if thereby furs might be gained. Once some Hudson’s Bay men discovered the tracks of Indians returning from a hunt. They at once gave a great ball, inviting the men of the near by post of the rival company. While they plied their guests with all forms of entertainment, a small party packed four sledges with trade goods and stole off to the Indian camp. The next day the Northwest men heard of the arrival of the Indians and went to them to barter for furs, only to find that all had been sold to the Hudson’s Bay traders. At another time two rival groups of traders met en route to an Indian camp and decided to make a night of it. But the Northwest men kept sober, and, when the Hudson’s Bay men were full of liquor, tied them to their sleds and started their dog teams back on the trail over which they had come. The Northwest traders then went on to the Indians and secured all the furs.

The Hudson’s Bay Company sends all of its raw skins to London, where they are graded and prepared for the auction sales attended by fur buyers from all over the world. It does not sell any in Canada.

Nevertheless, the Dominion is an important fur-making centre. During a recent visit to Quebec, I spent a morning with the manager of a firm which handles millions of dollars’ worth of furs every year. It has its own workshops where the skins are cured and the furs dressed and made into garments. The name of this firm is Holt, Renfrew and Company. Let us go back to Quebec and pay it a visit.

Imagine a quarter of a million dollars’ worth of furs under one roof! Picture to your minds raw skins in bales, just as they were unloaded from an Indian canoe, and then look again and see wraps and coats made from them that would each bring five thousand dollars when sold on Fifth Avenue. If your imagination is vivid enough you may see the American beauties who will wear them and know how the furs will add to the sparkle of their eyes and at the same time lighten the purses of their sweethearts and husbands.

We shall first go to the cold storage rooms. Here are piles of sealskins from our Pribilof Islands. Put one of these furs against your cheek. It feels like velvet. In these rooms are beavers from Labrador, sables from Russia, and squirrels from Siberia. There are scores of fox skins—blue, silver, black, and white. Some of them come from the cold arctic regions and others from fox farms not twenty minutes distant by motor. Take a look at this cloak of silvery gray fur. A year ago the skins from which it was made were on the backs of hair seals swimming in the mouth of the St. Lawrence River.

As we go through the factory, some of the secrets of fur making are whispered to us. For example, this bale contains fifteen hundred skins of the muskrat. The animals which produced them will change their names after a trip to the dyers. They will go into the vats and when they come out they will be Hudson Bay seals, and eventually will find their way into a black coat with a wonderful sheen. Years ago the muskrat skin was despised. Now it is made into coats that, under the trade name of Hudson seal, bring nearly as much as those of real seal.

Here are two Russian sables, little fellows of beautiful fur, that together will form a single neck piece. The undressed skins are worth seven hundred dollars the pair. As we look, the manager shows us two native sables that seem to be quite as fine. He tells us they can be had for eighty-five dollars each, or less than a quarter of the price of the Russian.

The most valuable fur in the world to-day is the sea otter, of which this firm gets only three or four skins in a year. But, in contrast, over there is a whole heap of Labrador otters, beautiful furs, which will wear almost for ever and will look almost as well as the sea otter itself. But you can have your choice of these at forty dollars apiece. They are cheap chiefly because the Labrador skin is not in fashion with women. Fashion in furs is constantly changing. Not many years ago a black fox skin often brought as much as fifteen hundred dollars. To-day, so many are coming from the fur farms that the price has fallen to one hundred and fifty dollars. Scarcity is one of the chief considerations in determining the value of furs, and fashion always counts more than utility. The rich, like the kings of old, demand something that the poor cannot have, and lose their interest in the genuine furs when their imitations have become common and cheap.