he
Red River, threw a wrench into the machinery.

The Canadian authorities who wisely carried through the negotiations
with the Hudson's Bay Company and the Imperial Government seem to have
blundered by overlooking the fact that the new territory had within its
borders some 10,000 people, apart from the Indians, who ought to have
been informed in some official way of the bargain that was being made,
and of the steps that were being taken to conserve the rights and
privileges of these early settlers.

It is true that rumours of the transaction reached the Red River country
through unauthoritative sources, but the main result was to produce a
feeling of uneasiness amongst the people there. And especially was this
the case when the rumours were given point by overt acts. Even before
the transfer of the country had been legally completed men were sent out
from the East to open roads from the Lakes into the settlements.
Surveying parties entered the new territory and went hither and thither,
driving their stakes and erecting their mounds, to the bewilderment of
the people, and to cap all the indiscretions, a Governor, the Hon.
William McDougall, was dispatched from Ottawa to the Red River before
the Hudson's Bay regime was formally superseded and before a Queen's
Proclamation, which would have been instantly recognized by all classes
in the community, was issued.

The Selkirk Settlers and other people of that class, however perplexed
at the procedure, had the utmost confidence that the Canadian
authorities would ultimately do substantial justice to all, and hence
they awaited patiently though somewhat anxiously the developments of
time. But the French half-breeds, more fiery and more easily excited,
more turbulent of spirit and warlike in disposition, accustomed to more
or less fighting on the plains, and withal, as a class, less well
informed than their white brethren, were not content to wait. They felt
that the course being followed by the Canadian authorities might lead to
the loss of their rights, and so they rose in a revolt, that while
accomplishing some of the objects that could have been reached by
constitutional means, left its red stream across that early page of our
history. But in the midst of all our statements let it be remembered, in
mitigation of the attitude of the Canadian authorities, that
communication between Ottawa and the West at that period was very
difficult. There were no railways nor telegraphs