manufactured to please the butter interest, has no foundation in either legal or scientific right. So when the Honorable Hudson Bay company taught the world, as far as it could, that all the country of their canoeroad-reached region was Russian tundra, and forever beyond cultivation, and by nature given up to only one product, that of fur producing, whereof the honorable gentlemen of the company were the competent and exclusive possessors, these honorable gentlemen lied, and they knew it; and for gain persisted in it to the end. When they, as history teachers, ever taught that Americans of the United States were the most dishonorable of traders, and the company only honorable, they also lied, and did it, too, systematically for years and years, even to Indians living on United States territory, so that murders resulted by the hundreds; and tribes of United States soil are yet unsafe because of these teachings of Englishmen of the company. I do not compare their diplomatic policy of Indian trade with the majority of United States traders, for history shows a contemptible littleness and dishonesty of our traders as compared with that of these gentlemen. But the rotten spot is, that the Hudson bay gentlemen were not careful of honesty as a principle, but because their policy for years was the best for gain. Gold was the English law, not right and integrity. Integrity enforced by gold is dishonorable, even if its mask of integrity is perfect. And when, in 1835, my father approached Oregon, there was such a grasp of this honorable company that the American Fur company dared not pass beyond the Rocky mountains. They climbed the summits, and at the interlocking of the Sweet Water river with the Colorado river, established their summer trading camp, because, though by United States and English treaty they had a right to go at their pleasure to and through Oregon, it was death to disobey the unwritten law of these honorable gentlemen. To this they added the lie that Oregon was a wet, cold, inhospitable, uninhabitable, worthless land, fit only for furs ; its salmon fishery valueless, and no one had any rights but themselves; while by the then almost unknown channels of the canoe paths, they gloried in the deception. they had wrought in violation of all the rights of others. Yes they let Captain Wyeth, as Bancroft of the Pacific coast says, trade beyond the death line, did they? Surely the man's not a murderer who lets his victim live while slowly poisoning him! True history shows that Captain Wyeth was permitted in southeast Oregon to trade, to the extent of an appearance of treaty observance, and then was got rid of. My father saw him, but was seeing a man there temporarily by the allowance of the company the full equal rights of the United States treaty. So of a score of others, who began trade before 1835, and were aided directly or indirectly by this honorable company to fail to establish themselves in our own territory. But my discussion and presentation of historic facts are not so much to show how even good, excellent merchants in corporations may, knowingly or unconsciously, commit great injustice, and crimes that are blasting on the interests of civilization and of humanity and Christianity, as it is to indicate the element that used the canoe road as its implement of travel and success. If I have just reasons to say that the final opinion of mankind will be, that with the name of honorable no corporations ever existed so baneful to the interests of the world as the "Honorable Hudson Bay Company" and the "Honorable East India Company," it is because I cannot be indifferent either to the demoralization that attended the Hudson Bay company in the same manner as the English parliament saw was the influence of the Honorable East India company. And the evils of both companies are still the stumblingblocks of the world, with this difference: those of the Hudson Bay company are nearly at an end; those of the East India company yet afflict for evil India and China.* The canoe of these paths was fully described by Alexander McKenzie to be a boat made by lapped sheets of birch bark, fastened to a tough wood skeleton of ribs, and some three to five feet wide, * Had the policy of this company prevailed to this day there would have been no California, no settlements beyond the Rocky mountains, no Pacific railways, no boundless enterprise for the United States, no wheat-growing northwest. We should have been struggling states; poor, without influence and education. All of British America, all of "the Oregon," and some thirty feet long. The bark is ous trees. The capacity of these canoes all of California and much of the magnificent north- changed furs for them, the Yukon "houses" west would to-day have been regarded as uninhabitable wild lands, never to be cultivated. And let me say that in 1835-6-7 missionaries, of which my father was one, broke the "honorable" company's spell and began the vast onward of the whole of this territory they then ruled with a rod of iron. It was the sin of these Hudson Bay and India honorable companies that they knew only trade, and did noth ing for humanity, education, civilization or religion, and this with a greed that is indescribable. or fortified buildings or forts generally not receiving them until the fourth year. To do this well, by an even consistent plan, gentlemen of England; and, the exceprequired the skill of the best mercantile tions named on a previous page discarded, they did well this vast and long-planned scheme of trade. Y. EDITORIAL NOTES. THE history of the Prohibition National party, commenced in this issue, is specially commended, from the fact that it has been prepared by George L. Case of Cleveland, one of the leaders of that party, who has been gathering for years the material of which he is now making use. It is a plain and interesting statement of a movement that must be regarded as important, even though one has no sympathy with the political principles of which it is the exponent. Ar the regular quarterly meeting of the Chicago Historical society, held on Tuesday, October 8, it was reported by Secretary John Moses, that the accessions to the library during the last quarter were 199 volumes and 152 pamphlets, of which but two were purchased. Among the 197 volumes donated are included 104 of public documents, of which 25 relate to the United States, including a costly geological and mineralogical atlas of Leadville; 60, consisting of laws and reports, to Vermont; and 20 to Kansas. For three of the most valuable works presented, the society is indebted to the Smithsonian institute, namely, Archives of the National Museum of Rio de Janeiro,' 'Proceedings and Transactions of the Royal Society of Canada' and 'Geological and Natural History Survey of Canada.' The society is also indebted to Mrs. Dr. Levi D. Boone for the gift of a set of bank-notes issued by the Bank of Edwardsville in 1819-20, of which bank her father, Judge Theophilus W. Smith, whose portrait hangs on our walls, was once the cashier. They are handsomely framed, and are supposed to be the only complete collection of the issue extant. Ar the recent monthly meeting of the Oneida Historical society of Utica, New York, a step forward was taken by the offering of the following resolution : "WHEREAS, The library of the society is growing most rapidly in bound volumes, magazines, pamphlets, manuscripts, newspapers-all of great historical value; and, "WHEREAS, The shelving room, so kindly placed at the society's disposal by the courtesy of the commissioners of education of this city, is now more than occupied, and much printed matter can not be made accessible; and, "WHEREAS, Many of the donations given are maps, portraits, curios, relics, etc., which can neither be displayed nor properly cared for; therefore be it "Resolved, That a committee of five be appointed by the chair to consider the expediency of securing some permanent building adapted to the present need of the society, and provide for its future possessions." After some discussion, President Roberts stated that the society has a sum-not a large one-on deposit already, pledged to the erection of a building. Outside of the county, he said, the society is credited with doing good work, and the idea has been growing that it needs greater facilities. The real question is whether the community appreciates the work of the society sufficiently to aid it in securing a permanent home. The work of the society speaks for itself. The monuments erected under its auspices are the outward signs of good work done in preserving the history of Oneida county and the Mohawk valley for the state and the Nation. If the people do not already appreciate the work done by the society, it is only necessary to wait, for it is certain that sooner or later it will impress the community so that a suitable home will be provided for it. Mr. Roberts decidedly favored the adoption of the resolution. The resolution was adopted unanimously. President Roberts appointed the following gentlemen on the committee: William M. White, C. W. Darling, Honorable C. W. Hutchinson, R. S. Williams and J. M. Childs. In answer to an inquiry the president stated that invitations had been given to a number of gentlemen to prepare papers on the early settlers of the different nationalities in the Mohawk valley. J. C. Schreiber has promised a paper on German settlers, and at the next meeting of the society Rev. Erasmus W. Jones will read a paper on "The Early Welsh Settlers of the Mohawk Valley." The annual address on the second Tuesday in January will be given by Dr. Willis J. Beecher of Auburn Theological seminary. THE collection of tariff literature on the shelves of the Wisconsin State Historical society's library is by all means the largest in the west. It embraces both foreign and American publications, on both sides of the great question; and no important book or pamphlet on the subject, issued during this year or the last ten, is missing. Secretary Thwaites has also been particularly successful in gathering the general literature of the present campaignRepublican, Democratic and Prohibition; this he will have neatly bound up in volumes, indexed and catalogued, for future reference. It has been a campaign prolific in literary efforts, and in future years this great mass of books, pamphlets and leaflets will be studied with profit by historians and politicians. The secretary has done well to make his invaluable collection before election, for these ephemeral political publications, that will be so full of suggestions and striking lessons for future students of our economic history, will be scarce enough in another fortnight, and rarities at the close of the year; it is astonishing how quickly such editions are lost sight of after the date of issue. This collection is one of the many evidences that the State Historical library is being kept well abreast of the times. GENERAL C. W. DARLING, corresponding secretary of the Oneida Historical society at Utica, New York, has been making an effort to ascertain why certain states in the Union have no mottoes. The answers to his communications as they come in from various sources are as follows: The governor of the state of New Hampshire says he does not know and has no means of finding out the reason why. The secretary of the state of North Carolina says that it is the habit of that state to illustrate her ideas by actions rather than by words, and that the use of such mottoes does not accord with her ideas of the purest heraldic taste. The governor of Indiana, through his private secretary, says that the reason is unknown to him. The governor of Texas writes that to answer this question would require a knowledge of the motives, views and intentions of every congress that met in the Republic, and of every legislature since it has been a state. He adds: "If I should guess at it I would say that Texas has not been poetically inclined, and that while she has never adopted by law any motto, she has had one since the fall of the Alamo, to-wit: Be sure you are right, then go ahead." The governor of Alabama intimates that he does not know why his state has not adopted a motto if "Here we rest" is not such. Tennessee, through the corresponding secretary of the Tennessee Historical society, writes that in the Great Seal of the state are the words "Commerce and Agriculture,” and those words may be supposed to take the place of a state motto. A. A. Graham, corresponding secretary of the Ohio State Archæological society, reports thus for Ohio: "In 1803 the general assembly passed an act relative to a state seal, and therein was described the device to be used upon it; also placing thereon the motto, Imperium in Imperio." In 1868 the general assembly passed an act restoring the seal of 1803, and omitting the motto. The proceedings of the house do not show why these changes were made; they merely show the motions, amendments, votes, etc., but as no debates were published, no reasons appear. |