near Montreal. This
energetic man largely extended the geographical knowledge of the wide
dominions entrusted to his charge, though like all the servants of the
company, he discouraged settlement and minimised the agricultural
capabilities of the country, when examined in 1857 before a committee of
the English house of commons. In 1837 the company purchased from Lord
Selkirk's heirs all their rights in Assiniboia. The Scotch settlers and
the French half-breeds were now in close contiguity to each other on the
Red and Assiniboine Rivers. The company established a simple form of
government for the maintenance of law and order. In the course of time,
their council included not only their principal factors and officials,
but a few persons selected from the inhabitants. On the whole, law and
order prevailed in the settlements, although there was always latent a
certain degree of sullen discontent against the selfish rule of a mere
fur company, invested with such great powers. The great object of the
company was always to keep out the pioneers of settlement, and give no
information of the value of the land and resources of their vast domain.

Some years before the federation of the British-American provinces the
public men of Canada had commenced an agitation against the company,
with the view of relieving from its monopoly a country whose resources
were beginning to be known. Colonial delegates on several occasions
interviewed the imperial authorities on the subject, but no practical
results were obtained until federation became an accomplished fact.
Then, at length, the company recognised the necessity of yielding to
the pressure that was brought to bear upon them by the British
government, at a time when the interests of the empire as well as of the
new Dominion demanded the abolition of a monopoly so hostile to the
conditions of modern progress in British North America. In 1868
successful negotiations took place between a Canadian delegation--Sir
George Cartier and the Hon. William Macdougall--and the Hudson's Bay
Company's representatives for the surrender of their imperial domain.
Canada agreed to pay L300,000 sterling, and to reserve certain lands for
the company. The terms were approved by the Canadian parliament in 1869,
and an act was passed for the temporary government of Rupert's Land and
the North-west territory when regularly transferred to Canada. In the
summer of that year, surveyors were sent under Colonel De