The Minneapolis journal. [volume] (Minneapolis, Minn.) 1888-1939, 1905-02-18
HUDSON'S- Bay COlNPANY rs
llAWVED BY SHREUID SCOTS
Coming From the Bleak Highland Glens Of Scotland,
- They Thrice in the Businesses of the Canadia,,
s.a21: - Northwest Edmonton the Greatest P,J-
@.<..#s mary Eur Market in World.

not lost it's old business. It is still the |
greatest fur trader in the world, altho
it no longer has a monopoly, and about |
half the fur business in Canada is now
done by independent traders. just as
Minneapolis is the greatest primary
wheat market in the world, so is this
city of Edmonton the greatest primary
both cases signifying the market where
the actual producer sells to the trader.
Yesterday three creaking, grooming
wagons, piled high with odorous skins,
rolled into Edmonton. They had come
ninety miles overland from Athabasca
Landing, little port on the Athabasca
river. to which canoes and l bargss from on
last winters catch. The three wagon
loads that came into Edmonton yester:
day were taken to great high-roofed
warehouse. There the furs were sorted.
In one pile lay a score of skins Of the
scarce musk OK, scarce and yet not val,
liable because of the coarse hair and
ineradicable odor; There was pile
and, hundreds Of fox skins, including
half a dozen Of the rare black fox.
There were two big piles Of lynx skins,
for this is a fat year with this animal.
The lynx, the trappers tell you, run in
cycles. One year out of every seven,
scarcely any come to. market. This
they account for by: explaining that the
breeds so fast that nature must make
an automatic check by sending once in
every seven years an epidemic which
leaves but a handful living. - 1870,
When the furs were all sorted, and
lay in piles about the great warehouse,
come the buyers, eight or ten Scotch
men of long experience, shrewd men of
business, in dress and manner not at all
unlike the men who might gather at a
ton. They go about from pile to pile,
stroking the furs to feel their texture
and holding them UP to the light to
catch their luster. When each had sat-
isfed himself, he wrote out on piece of
paper his bid for the lot, sealed it and
left it with the owner. Those three
wagon loads Of furs that came in yes
terday were sold for $4,000. It repre-
sented the years product Of perhaps
two hundred individual trappers. The
seller did not take his pay in cash.. He
got steel traps-these were brought into
Edmonton in carload lots-warm wooden
clothing, powder and shot, sugar and
salt and the like. These he took in
his wagons back to Athabasca Landing,
where each trapper got his Individual
share. Thus does the fur trade 90 on.
How the Skins Are Marketed.
The actual trapper, Indian, halfbreed
all the waterways Of the north to Atha-
basca Landing, thence the grooming
wagons carry them over ninety miles Of
rude roads to Edmonton, and out Of
Edmonton they go in carload lots,
valued at over a hundred thousand dol
lars each, bound for Montreal and thence
for London. There, once year,
gather the fur buyers Of all the world to
make the purchases which supply furs
for the aristocracy Of st. Petersburg,
to line the cloaks Of Turkish beys, and
enormously profitable one.> In Edmon-
ton there are scores of handsome homes,
and fortunes that would be envied in
New York, possessed by men who began
with a hundred dollars worth of traps
and powder and shot to trade with the
Indians, The Indian is easy to bargain
ues. If he doesn t happen to want a
thing, he wouldn't give a snap Of his
sic value of Koh-i-noor. And if he
does want it, even if it be but the dis
carded red coat Of mounted policeman,
he must have it., and he will give the
1dSL VI LIS pOSSeSSlOuS IOf IL. In trading
with such a race, for those who have
learned to know the Indian g likes, there
is obviously much profit. The Indian is
constitutionally improvident. He can
not grasp why. any one should want
more property than enough for one more
meal. The notion of a surplus is as in.
comprehensive to him as the finer dis.
functions Of the higher criticism That
he has survived at all is proof that the
Hudson s. Bay company has on the whole
dealt kindly with him and exercised q
fatherl y supervision over his affairs tc
tide him over years of famine. And yet !
should not like to assert that every In.
dian who ever brought black foxskin
into Edmonton got full value for it. A
black foxskin is the Koh-i-noor of the
fur trade. A score, perhaps, are brought
in each year, and they win small for
tunes for their owners. One was sold il
Edmonton for $1,72O-the trader who
bought it showed me the entry in his
oldest of all, the fur trade does, not
fall off. Statistics are not kept, but
they say in Edmonton that the volume
OF fqrs last year was the greatest in the
fact that 100000 Settlers SPl'e ye al a are
taking up the land The animals must
retreat each year farther and farther
into the north, but there is compensa
ton in the fact that the northern woods
are safer, the trappers find it more
and more difficult to. cover the ground
And SO the Hudson g Bay company bids
fair to 90 on some centuries more as
| great fur trader, with 16O posts scat
| tered over Mackenzie Land. the ,.Yukor
and the shores of Hudson 3 bay. an6
some 1000 employees. s..,- =