Following the usual route by River Winnipeg, Lake Winnipeg, and Red River, Fort Garry was soon reached, and here the Governor somewhat changed his plans. He determined to cross the prairies by light conveyances, and accordingly on July 3rd, at five in the morning, with his fellow-travellers, with only six men, three horses, and one light cart, the Emperor of the Plains left Fort Garry under a salute and with the shouting of the spectators, as he started on his journey to skirt the winding Assiniboine River.
A thousand miles over the prairie in July is one of the most cheery and delightsome journeys that can be made. The prairie flowers abound, their colours have not yet taken on the full blaze of yellow to be seen a month later, and the mosquitoes have largely passed away on the prairies. The weather, though somewhat warm, is very rarely oppressive on the plains, where a breeze may always be felt. This long journey the party made with most reckless speed—doing it in three weeks, and arriving at Edmonton House, to be received by the firing of guns and the presence of nine native chiefs of the Blackfeet, Piegans, Sarcees, and Bloods, dressed in their grandest clothes and decorated with scalp locks. "They implored me," says the Governor, "to grant their horses might always be swift, that the buffalo might instantly abound, and that their wives might live long and look young."
Four days sufficed at Edmonton on the North Saskatchewan to provide the travellers with forty-five fresh horses. They speedily passed up the Saskatchewan River, meeting bands of hostile Sarcees, using supplies of pemmican, and soon catching their first view of the white peaks of the Rocky Mountains. Deep muskegs and dense jungles were often encountered, but all were overcome by the skill and energy of the expert fur trader Row and their guide. Through clouds of mosquitoes they advanced until the sublime mountain scenery was beheld whenever it was not obscured with the smoke arising from the fires through this region, which was suffering from a very dry season. At length Fort Colville, on the Columbia River, was gained after nearly one thousand miles from Edmonton; and this journey, much of it mountain travelling, had averaged forty miles a day. The party from Fort Garry had been travelling constantly for six weeks and five days, and they had averaged eleven and a half hours a day in the saddle. The weather had been charming, with a steady cloudless sky, the winds were light, the nights cool, and the only thing to be lamented was the appearance of the whole party, who, with tattered garments and crownless hats, entered the fort.
Embarking below the Chaudière Falls of the Columbia, the company took boats, worked by six oars each, and the water being high they were able to make one hundred, and even more miles a day, in due course reaching Fort Vancouver.
At Fort Vancouver Governor Simpson met Trader Douglas—afterward Sir James Douglas. He accompanied the party, which now took horses and crossed country by a four days' journey to Fort Nisqually. Here on the shore of Puget Sound lay the ship Beaver, and embarking on her the party went on their journey to Sitka, the chief place in Alaska, whence the Governor exchanged dignified courtesies with the Russian Governor Etholin, and enjoyed the hospitality of his "pretty and lady-like" wife. In addition, Governor Simpson examined into the Company's operations (the Hudson's Bay Company had obtained exclusive licence of this sleepy Alaska for twenty years longer), and found the trade to be 10,000 fur seals, 1000 sea otters, 12,000 beaver, 2500 land otters,——foxes and martins, 20,000 sea-horse teeth.
The return journey was made, the Beaver calling, as she came down the coast, at Forts Stikine, Simpson, and McLoughlin. In due course Fort Vancouver was reached again. Sir George's journey to San Francisco, thence to Sandwich Islands, again direct to Alaska, and then westward to Siberia, and over the long journey through Siberia on to St. Petersburg, we have no special need to describe in connection with our subject. The great traveller reached Britain, having journeyed round the globe in the manner we have seen, in nineteen months and twenty-six days.
Enough has been shown of Sir George's career, his administration, method of travel, and management, to bring before us the character of the man. At times he was accompanied on his voyages to more accessible points by Lady Simpson, and her name is seen in the post of Fort Frances on Rainy River and in Lake Frances on the upper waters of the Liard River, discovered and named by Chief Factor Robert Campbell. Sir George lived at Lachine, near Montreal, where so many retired Hudson's Bay Company men have spent the sunset of their days. He took an interest in business projects in Montreal, held stock at one time in the Allan Line of steamships, and was regarded as a leader in business and affairs in Montreal. He passed away in 1860. Sir E. W. Watkin, in his work, "Recollections of Canada and the States," gives a letter from Governor Dallas, who succeeded Sir George, in which reference is made to "the late Sir George Simpson, who for a number of years past lived at his ease at Lachine, and attended more apparently to his own affairs than to those of the Company." Whether this is a true statement, or simply the biassed view of Dallas, who was rather rash and inconsiderate, it is hard for us to decide.
Governor Simpson lifted the fur trade out of the depth into which it had fallen, harmonised the hostile elements of the two Companies, reduced order out of chaos in the interior, helped, as we shall see, various expeditions for the exploration of Rupert's Land, and though, as tradition goes and as his journey around the world shows, he never escaped from the witchery of a pretty face, yet the business concerns of the Company were certainly such as to gain the approbation of the financial world.