"You know not what you say. A thousand men came into Oregon last year. It iss like one of the great migrations of the peoples of Asia, of Europe. I say to you, it iss a great epoch. There iss a folk-movement such as we haf not seen since the days of the Huns, the Goths, the Vandals, since the Cimri movement. It iss an epoch, my friend! It iss fate that iss in it." "So, then, it is a great country?" I asked. "It iss so great, these traders do not wish it known. They wish only that it may be savage; also that their posts and their harems may be undisturbed. That iss what they wish. These Scots go wild again, in the wilderness. They trade and they travel, but it iss not homes they build. Sir George Simpson wants steel traps and not ploughs west of the Rockies. That iss all!" "They do not speak so of Doctor McLaughlin," I began tentatively. "My friend, a great man, McLaughlin, believe me! But he iss not McKay; he iss not Simpson; he iss not Behrens; he iss not Colville; he iss not Douglas. And I say to you, as I learned last night--you see, they asked me also to tell what I knew of Oregon--I say to you that last night McLaughlin was deposed. He iss in charge no more--so soon as they can get word to him, he loses his place at Vancouver." "After a lifetime in the service!" I commented. "Yess, after a lifetime; and McLaughlin had brain and heart, too. If England would listen to him, she would learn sometings. He plants, he plows, he bass gardens and mills and houses and herds. Yess, if they let McLaughlin alone, they would haf a civilization on the Columbia, and not a fur-trading post. Then they could oppose your civilization there. That iss what he preaches. Simpson preaches otherwise. Simpson loses Oregon to England, it may be." "You know much about affairs out in Oregon," I ventured again. "Now, I did not happen to be present at the little meeting last night." "I heard it all," he remarked carelessly, "until I went to sleep. I wass bored. I care not to hear of the splendor of England!" "Then you think there is a chance of trouble between our country and England, out there?" He smiled. "It iss not a chance, but a certainty," he said. "Those settlers will not gif up. And England is planning to push them out!" "We had not heard that!" I ventured. "It wass only agreed last night. England will march this summer seven hundred men up the Peace River. In the fall they will be across the Rockies. So! They can take boats easily down the streams to Oregon. You ask if there will be troubles. I tell you, yess." "And which wins, my friend?" I feared he would hear my heart thumping at this news. "If you stop where you are, England wins. If you keep on going over the mountains England shall lose." "What time can England make with her brigades, west-bound, my friend?" I asked him casually. He answered with gratifying scientific precision.