many pathfinders, but he had unlocked a new Empire for the human
family. Then for years there was silence around the Bay which Hudson had
opened at such great cost to himself.

Away in the East, following the early explorations along the banks of
the St. Lawrence in old Canada, adventurous hunters and trappers began
to push their way westward and northward, past the Great Lakes to the
prairie land beyond. This was about the middle of the seventeenth
century, and at that period the New World was full of opportunity for
the daring who saw visions beyond the sky-line.

And so it came to pass about half a century after Hudson's time that two
French adventurers, Radisson and Groseilliers, reaching out from the St.
Lawrence to the wide north-west, came into contact with Indian tribes
who told about the great bay to the north and the vast riches of the
region in furs and skins. These adventurers went to see for themselves
and they found that the half had not been told. And because, despite
many theories, no one has ever discovered a way to carry on a big
enterprise without capital, these hardy pioneers returned to the East
and endeavoured to organize a trading company from amongst their French
compatriots. But the enthusiasm of the men who had seen could not awaken
response in the men who had not seen. The faculty of faith was not very
highly developed in these French habitants by the St. Lawrence. But the
zeal of Radisson and Groseilliers was unquenchable. They tried Boston in
vain, and then betook themselves to France, where they were not any more
successful, except that they got a letter of introduction to some men of
leading in England. The Englishman generally loves a sporting chance for
exploration and discovery, and so Prince Rupert, more or less a soldier
of fortune who had lent his name and his sword to almost anything that
offered a possibility of adventure or substance, took up the matter of
the fur trade and was instrumental in sending out vessels with Radisson
and Groseilliers to prospect on the shores of Hudson Bay. Once again the
men who went and saw came back, not only with tales of an El Dorado in
fur, but with the furs themselves, and the dashing Prince forthwith
secured from the easy-going Charles II a monopolistic charter to trade
and generally to control the whole vast region drained by rivers that
emptied into Hudson Bay. The territory thus granted, with more added
later by licences, extended generally s