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son's Bay man, who wanted nothing but the furry skins of dead animals. understood that proposition. The Hudson's Bay man deprived him of nothing, but bought the pelt he had for sale, and that was a positive gain. But the American was a different man. He came preaching peace and good will to all men, but he took up land, raised crops, built mills, bred domestic animals, sold the produce of the land for money to put in his pocket. There was no gain to the Indian in that, but a positive loss-the loss of land. And worse than this; where there was one American in 1842, there were hundreds in 1843, and then hosts more coming. He had heard from the wandering Iroquois how the white man came as flocks of wild geese come and covered the prairies of Indiana, Illinois and other states. The Indian was terrified at the thought of losing his land, his home, his mother, and so he acted.

We are now able to give for the first time in history the first authentic account of the first great Indian council held west of the Rocky mountains by the Indians of Old Oregon. We print on another page the photograph of Timotsk, an aged Indian, a chief of the Klickitats, who was a member of that council. This council was held near where Fort Simcoe is located in the Yakima valley. Indian messengers had been sent out by the Cayuses to all other tribes in the Columbia river region and chiefs had come in from the Nez Perces, Spokanes, Shoshones, Walla Wallas, Wascoes, Umatillas, Cayuses, Klickitats and Yakimas. Timotsk says they were in council for "a whole moon;" that is about a month; and that there were about fifty chiefs in attendance. They talked from day to day as to what course they should pursue against the white men. The burden of all their fears and complaints were against the Americans; and was summed up in the belief that these white men would come more and more every year and finally take all their lands and hunting grounds from them; that they were even now killing and driving away all the deer, and that after a while the Indians would have nothing to eat and must die. The Yakima, Cayuses, Walla Wallas, and some of the Spokanes advocated killing off all the Americans at once. The Nez Perces, Wascoes, Umatillas and Klickitats opposed this course, saying that the white men had good guns to fight with and would easily kill off the Indians who had but a few guns and must fight mostly with bows and arrows.

After this council broke up, Timotsk came down to Vancouver and got employment of Dr. McLoughlin as a boatman, in which work he continued for many years. He speaks of McLoughlin as a good man, a father to everybody, whites and Indians alike. As soon after this council had broken up and the measles broke out among the Indians at the Whitman mission, Dr. Whitman and family were massacred. Whitman would have been killed all the same if no sickness had occurred, as he was blamed by the Indians for going back over the mountains and bringing more white men out to Oregon. The Cayuses made it plain at the council that they would go on the war path and kill all the whites they could. And that is what they did do.

In some places the Indian population in the United States seems to be increasing slightly, but in other places it is decreasing.

In 1910 the Indian population of the United States was 265,683, as compared with 237,196 in 1900. According to these figures there was an increase in the Indian population from 1900 to 1910 of 28,487, or 12 per cent, as compared with

H

a decrease from 1890 to 1900 of 11,057, or 4.5 per cent. For the twenty-year period from 1890 to 1910 there was an increase of 17,430, or 7 per cent.

The last census shows that the Indian population of the Pacific coast is for the state of Washington, 10,997; Oregon, 5,090; California, 16,371; Idaho, 3,488. The Indians evidently live longer and do better in a warm climate than in a cold one.

THAN

CHAPTER IV

1640-1824

THE PIONEERS OF THE FUR TRADE-GROSEILLIERS AND RADISSON-PRINCE RUPERT SENDS OUT A SHIP-THE HUDSON BAY COMPANY-THE NORTHWEST COMPANY OF CANADA-INDEPENDENT AMERICAN TRAPPERS-THE RENDEZVOUS—THE WAR BETWEEN ENGLISHMEN AND SCOTCHMEN-FUR TRADING STARTS FROM ST. LOUISTHE MISSOURI FUR COMPANY-JOHN JACOB ASTOR ENTERS THE FIELD-ORGANIZES THE PACIFIC FUR COMPANY-FOUNDS ASTORIA DESTRUCTION OF ASTOR'S ENTERPRISE-TREATMENT OF THE INDIANS BY THE FUR TRADERS-THE SERVICES OF THE FUR TRADERS TO CIVILIZATION.

In opening the great Northwest region of North America to the settlement and occupation by white men the catching of wild animals for the value of their furry skins was the first business that promised trade and wealth. Wholly unlike the experiences of the Spaniards in Mexico and Peru, where the invaders found gold and silver beyond the dreams of avarice, and which they could seize by robbery of the lawful owner and then torture him with flames to discover the mines of the precious metals, the explorers of the great Northern wilderness had to contend with all the forces of nature and tax their physical strength to the utmost limit to secure success. And the remarkable contrast between the ethical results of the fur trade pushed by hardy, vigorous and independent men in the wilderness of the north, and the wholesale robbery of simple-minded Aztecs and Peruvians in the south by the armed freebooters of Spain, is one of the most forcible and persistent lessons of civilization on the American continent. On the one hand is seen the heroic examples of the pioneers of the northwest conquering the wilderness by following a peaceful industry and opening the way for great states that command the respect and dominate the forces of the New World, while on the other hand, is beheld the cancer of unrestrained avarice as the curse of feeble and unstable governments that are rent with bloody strife and unceasing rebellion.

With no other object or ambition than to make large profits, the fur traders, their ship captains and wilderness trappers, have been most effective agents in opening new countries and extending the boundaries of civilization to organize governments. When Captain Cook's ship carried over to China and exhibited to the traders of the world the little pack of otter skins that had been picked up at Vancouver's island, an impulse was given to the exploration of the Pacific coast that never halted until Oregon was secured to the United States and gold discovered in California.. Not the Spanish, the French, the English, or the East India Company's ships would have led the way to the settlement of the country and the founding of states. This region was too far from their bases of sup

plies. But the rich fur trade excited the interest of Boston merchants, and Capt. Gray was sent out to see what he could get for his employers. He got his share of the furs, and he discovered the Columbia river. The Boston merchants sent other ships and the discovery of the Columbia river planted a germ in the brain of a great American statesman (Jefferson) that grew and expanded until expeditions were sent out two thousand miles through the wilderness to connect the expanding nation with Gray's discovery of the great river; and the titanie forces of American pioneering, settlements and Republicanism completed the transcontinental bond of union and made Oregon the pioneer outpost and defender of American commerce and civilization on the great Pacific.

The French founded the city of Quebec on the St. Lawrence in 1608. Two years later, Henry Hudson discovered the great northern bay of the North Atlantic ocean, which bears his name. Then commenced the conquest of the New World on the line of settlement up the St. Lawrence, up the Great Lakes, north to Hudson's Bay and west to the Rocky mountains. This projection of European colonization, trade and laws into the heart of North America, commenced in 1640, and its forerunner was the fur trade. In 1659 two French traders and trappers, Groseilliers and Radisson, working their way up the Great Lakes in the employ of the French Company of One Hundred Associates, reached the head of Lake Superior, and there learned from the Indians that by traveling on northward overland they could reach the shores of Hudson's Bay where there were vast numbers of fur-bearing animals. The success of these two adventurous Frenchmen in getting so large a catch of rare and rich furs excited the cupidity of their superiors, so that when the men who had braved the perils of the wilderness asked for a concession from the French government to take furs in the Hudson's Bay regions, they found they had been forestalled and the coveted privileges given to another. Disappointed and indignant at the treatment he had received from the Colonial grantees, Groseilliers returned to France and sought to undo the wrong and injustice wrought upon him by an appeal to the king; and failing in this he went over to England and submitted his proposed scheme to the English court. In this he was successful, and under the protection and aid of Prince Rupert, the cousin of King Charles II, Groseilliers was in 1668 outfitted with a vessel, cargo and all necessary arms and supplies and sailed for the Hudson's bay. And the success of this Frenchman led to the formation of the great transcontinental monopoly of the fur trade known as the Hudson's Bay Company, which was granted a royal charter on May 2, 1670. The royal patent reads as follows:

"Whereas, our dear entirely beloved cousin, Prince Rupert, Count Palatine of the Rhine, Duke of Bavaria and Cumberland; George Duke of Albermarle; William, earl of Craven; Henry, Lord Arlington; Anthony, Lord Ashley; Sir John Robinson and Sir Robert Vyrner, knights and baronets, Sir Peter Colleton, baronet; Sir Edward Hungerford, knight of the bath; Sir Paul Neele, Sir John Griffith, Sir Philip Carteet and Sir James Hayes, knights, and John Kirke, Francis Millington, William Prettyman and John Portman, citizen and goldsmith of London, have, at their own great cost and charges, undertaken an expedition for the Hudson's bay in the northwest parts of America for a discovery of a new passage into the South Sea (Pacific ocean), and for the finding of some trade for furs, minerals and other commodities, and by such, their undertakings have