[CHAPTER XLII.]
THE HUDSON'S BAY COMPANY AND THE INDIANS.
The Company's Indian policy—Character of officers—A race of hunters—Plan of advances—Charges against the Company—Liquor restriction—Capital punishment—Starving Indians—Diseased and helpless—Education and religion—The age of missions—Sturdy Saulteaux—The Muskegons—Wood Crees—Wandering Plain Crees—The Chipewyans—Wild Assiniboines—Blackfeet Indians—Polyglot coast tribes—Eskimos—No Indian war—No police—Pliable and docile—Success of the Company.
From time to time the opponents of the Company have sought to find grounds for the overthrow of the licence to trade granted by the Government of Britain over the Indian territories. One of the most frequent lines of attack was in regard to the treatment of the Indians by the fur traders. It may be readily conceded that the ideal of the Company's officials was in many cases not the highest. The aim of Governor Simpson in his long reign of forty years was that of a keen trader. A politic man, the leader of the traders when in Montreal conformed to the sentiment of the city, abroad in the wilds he did very little to encourage his subordinates to cultivate higher aims among the natives. Often the missionary was found raising questions very disturbing to the monopoly, and this brought the Company officers into a hostile attitude to him. Undoubtedly in some cases the missionaries were officious and unfair in their criticisms.
But, on the other hand, the men and officers of the Company were generally moral. Men of education and reading the officers usually were, and their sentiment was likely to be in the right direction. The spirit of the monopoly—the golden character of silence, and the need of being secretive and uncommunicative—was instilled into every clerk, trapper, and trader.
