their fur trade, the company ship every
year their furs to London to be then—as
the reader need scarcely be told—sold by
auction at high prices: so that everything
owned out in Red River, in the way of
cash, with the exception of the little gold
and silver in circulation, consists of drafts
on account of fur shipped abroad, either on
Hudson's Bay Company account or private
account. There are sales of furs in the
United States and Canada, but it amounts
to the same thing; the only way in which
the settler or trader can meet his liabilities
is through drafts drawn against fur sold or
unsold.

The greater portion of the furs marketed
in St. Pauls, Minnesota, comes from the Red
River region. They are brought into the
trading posts by Indians who exchange
them for ammunition, blankets, &c. The
whole fur trade of this immense region
is valued at from one million to two millions
five hundred thousand dollars annually.
It is estimated that one hundred and fifty
thousand buffaloes are killed every year.
The hides, together with the tongue and
the better pieces of the meat are taken;
the tallow and the great portion of the
meat is allowed to go to waste, though
they might be made available for export
to the extent of one or two millions annually.
The Indians and half-breeds of the territory
are calculated to require, on an average,
supplies to the amount of ten dollars per
head, or about five hundred thousand dollars
per annum. At present there can hardly
be said to be any other established government
than the Hudson's Bay Company.
It has been greatly objected to, and any
government was supposed to be better;
but the old habitants seem yet to cling to
the old régime.

Every official was appointed by the
company, and the affairs of the settlement
were controlled by a body called "the
Council of Assiniboin." The company
supported good schools, and encouraged
clergy of all denominations. They appointed
both a Protestant and a Roman Catholic
bishop, and as the two denominations
divided the religious communities, the faith
of the latter predominating, there was
little religious dissension. Each had neat
churches. The law was administered by a
very worthy recorder (also appointed by
the company), and a number of petty
magistrates appointed by the Council of
Assiniboin.

Literature there was none worth
mentioning, in the writer's experience. It was
mainly confined to a few novels of the
"yellow kivered" kind which the Messrs.
Petersen's press pours out in American
profusion, and to a fortnightly newspaper,
the Nor' Wester. The new paper, the New
Nation, the writer has not yet seen, but
a copy of the Nor' Wester, issued under
the old Hudson's Bay régime, lies before
him. In politics it is half American, half
British, infused throughout with a good
deal of Red Riverishness and general hatred
of the Council of Assiniboin and the
Hudson's Bay Company's governor-general.
The postman who used to deliver it (after
a fashion), was a tall swarthy youth clad in
a blue cloth capote, scarlet worsted sash,
buckskin breeches, fringed, and beautifully
beaded mocassins; and his long hair was
kept back by a scarlet silk ribbon.

The most noticeable contents of the
paper are the advertisements of divers little
shopkeepers, with very French names.
A solitary sixpence is entered as received
for "one copy of the laws of Assiniboin,"
while the premium given for wolves' heads
amounts to fourteen pounds fifteen shillings.
The postal department does not help the
revenue much, for in this department the
expenditure exceeds the receipts by fifteen
pounds and twopence halfpenny.

The existing state of things at Red River
is mainly confined in its active operations
to the excitable French half-breeds, whose
pride has been hurt by cavalier treatment
on the part of the Dominion of Canada.
There are, however, in the back-ground
not a few designing demagogues who pull
the wires without getting themselves into
trouble. Those who know the inordinate
spread of the "Monro doctrine" among the
American community, cannot doubt the
feeling of the American settlements about
Pembina and the frontier generally, though
the American government is quite innocent
of complicity. It is worth remarking, too,
that the fleur-de-lis is combined on the
flag of the New Nation with the shamrock.

IN THAT STATE OF LIFE.

CHAPTER I.

IN one of the fairest districts of England,
on the borders of Devon and Somerset,
and hard by the sea, lies the noble
estate of Mortlands. It is noble, but
gloomier than words can paint. In the
winter the sun does not rise upon the
narrow valley overshadowed by dark
wooded hills till near noon, and leaves it