Iron County register. [volume] (Ironton, Iron County, Mo.) 1867-1965, 1899-02-09
AMERIcA pARCELED OUT.
Ln Former Days Whole States Served
as Presents to Royal
FavOrftes.

America has been freely parceled Qua
In gifts since Columbus first set eyes
on the new world Most of the United
States territory has been at some time
or other handed over to public and pri-
waite companies. New York, fnr ex-
ample, so years after it had been sold
for five pounds sterling, was presented,
with other lands, to the duke of York,
by his brother, the king, and the name
Of the city is a witness this day to that
transaction. The duke granted New
Jersey to somebody else. and few
years previously the king had carved
out Maryland for Lord Baltimore.
Pennsylvania was given to William
Penn, the Quaker who founded the
state, in payment of a debt which
Charles II. owed PENIS father, and the
same monarch gave both North and
South Carolina to eight London gen.
tlemen, who stayed at home, called
themselves the lords proprietors and
lived on the rents until the people threw
off the yoke, and George II. took over
the colonies.
The story of Col. Talbot, the Cecil
Rhodes of Canada at the beginning
of this century, is one of the romances
Of Canadian history. The colonel went
out in 1893 as an aid-de-camp to the gov
ernor, and the founding of a colony
became the ruling passion of his life.
He was given 900 acres, which grew
later on to CSC, 900, on condition that he
placed settler on every 200 acres. To-
day this territory is occupied by some
of the most fiourishing towns in the
dominion, and at the beginning of the
queens reign Col. Talbot, who was then
living, was the recognized chief of %
towns, all of which had been given him
years before as unoccupied land.
Prince Edward Island, covering 5000
square miles and embracing such -four
ishing towns as Georgetown, Charlotte
town and Princetown, were given away
in 1867 to absentee proprietors, and was
bought back again on the dominion of
Canada coming into being for $s0O.000.
The Canadian company. founded in
1926, received a grant of million acres
for nothing, and bought z, 300, 900 more
at the rate of so cents an acre.
The mention of the Hudson Bay com.
pany recalls probably the most famous
gifts of territory in history. In 1870
Charles II. gave Prince Rupert, by royal
charter, territory 200 or 800 miles wide
round the eastern and southern shores
of Hudson's bay, in addition to vast
empire of forest and prairie.
"Rupert's Land" as the territory was
called, became amazing in its extent,
ultimately stretching across Canada
from the Atlantic end of Hudson's
strait to the shores of the Pacific. AS
rent for this territory, covering $780,
900 square miles, the company paid to
the king 1.-TWO elks and two black
beavers" year.
Thirty years ago the Canadian con-
federation took over the company's
monopoly for $1,5oo,ooo, but the com
pany still retained twentieth part Of
its lands. The original capital of the
company was $4,000, and in two CEN
turtles it's income from furs was $780,
OOo, 900.
But the most amazing gift ever made
since the world began was surely that
made by James l. to Lord Stirling, the
poet, who was a great royal favorite in
the earlier half of the seventeenth CEN
fury. On the 21st of September, 1921,
King James, who must have been pitt
fully ignorant of geography. made
Lord Stirling, then Sir William Alex
ander, present of the whole of Can
ada. The gift, which included Nova
Scotia and Newfoundland, was con-
firmed by Charles l., and the poet was
so greatly moved by the high honor he
had received that he published IAN Er-
rouragementt to Colonies" work which
reached its third edition. The gift be-
came the subject of interesting legal
proceedings, and Canada once more be-
came the property of the crown.-Cin-