Daily Davenport Democrat. [volume] (Davenport, Iowa) 1864-1874, 1867-09-23
Gigantic Monopoly.

George Alfred Townsend, writing from
Canada to The Bos,on Pyst, makes the iol-
losiug curious statem,nt concerning thu
hudson Bay Company "W hat is the gi~
gtntic monopoly, WITH two-thids OF cons
tinent Tor It's game preserve! Whence come
lhc modern Niiurod staying his millions Vi
beaver aud buffalo every year. Are we
avalc Tint upon tins hemisphere there il n
private corporation owning nearly rs much
and as all The United SsatesI This is the
lludson's Bay Company, founded ia 1879,
sixty years before n house stood in Bal;is
more, twelve years before the Quskers sail
ed up the Delaware, anc three years before
Boston had wharf King Charles III.
madc the iludson's Bay Company arbitrary
aud despo,c oy,rs all the ie.ion wa,cred BY
the streams OF Iiudson's Bay. and fer two
ccntufi s us Governors have shat al this
world away from civliz d mankind They
have he'd az To ITS capacity for cultivation,
prefer, q to keep II heather wild for the
hiding Of " Dives and cstamoupts, and the
English Government has backed them up
10 tho wrong Of the Canadian people, who
have Just been exclu led from The fsir.st of
thu Northern lands. This enormous mo-
10, " employees 3 900 white men TO haul
ia boats ana make up ~ iurs, aud Ice, 900
lnGa hunters. With two millions seven
hundred thousands square mites under lis
control, oaly i2o,uoo people lac lit. For
Ia wears /. paid annual iydcbd- Of seven
~ per cent. \ far back rs l6sg-a huns
droi years before our Goyofnmen; organized
lit paid dividends oiiiity pea cent. /, ate
op sriyal iur company, no "Northwcst
era, about ioity Years aao, and in 1865
sost one million two LuuJi cd thousand
geld q 'iiar> worth 81 iurs, which cost 1t IL
inposts only two hundred thousand dollars
lthss one hundred and sixty four trading
poets, Is subject 10 no Law, warns people of
La inmense esta Z as YOU would warn h
man on, Of your office, and protests that
! ersin shall not grow in the hsunts of the
raeeoon. nor pray ers he sad where the INK
cruachos the bones Of the Indian sauaw.
| has association Of deeyslayets killed in lsJ6
10000 beavers, III 200 martens. 1000
| yuxcs, 10000 bea,s, SO, 900 foxes, 500, 200
mussrats, l2,VeO offers. 1860 skunks,
aud aboat $1,000 loser animals, besides
1900 uGliaiors 1t gives tie Indian a
pat ct glass beads upd n bottle ci rum for
u silver loN SKIN, which it se.is Tor 1850
goii. Ii steals, besides, from Unitei States
lands, $500. 900 gold in iurs every year and
We ought 10 have had military post on
Red River twenty years ago. At the north
end OF Lake Winnipeg there is . place Gals
led Norway House, where The Governors Of
five sub territories meet Governor Dallas,
commander over the mighty region, and
the spoil Of the year promptly divided
aud the Indians duly swindled. The hunts
Tor buffalo are two in numbe., each lasting
two months, and begin respectively June
20 aud November 10. The capital of the
company Is seven millions of gold dollars,
and they own . million gold dollars worth
ofproperty in American Oregon, secured
to them by the treaty Of 1876.
This cormorant company is now . s,ums
bling block in the way Of progress. Il
is dark age romance 10 see its canoes
come down the rapids freighting with furs !;
TO see its fields OF half breeds .disappcsr in.
70 the forests where all the long year the
Indian has been staying the game, making
bloody wilderness war. lying in ambush
sgains, the wolf, and challenging the white
bear TO SINGLE combat. At last the long
period of its hunting 10 over the overflow
Of thirty millions of people will make a
ircshes mp the stream Of the Winnipeg 70
drown out beast and slayer together, and
take by the throat the uncrcumcised cor.
pors,ion that would plant its svaice across
the gates ola hemisphere aud turn back
the sluices OF mankind.