{130} Mr. Carver, in his history of North America, observes, “that on the waters which fall into Lake Winnepeek, the neighbouring nations take a great many furs, some of them they carry to the Hudson’s Bay Company’s factories, situated at the entrance of the Bourbon River, but this they do with reluctance on several accounts; for some of the _Assinipoils_ and _Killistinoe_ Indians,[84] who usually traded with the company’s servants, told him that if they could be sure of a constant supply of goods from _Michillimakinac_, they would not trade any where else; that they shewed him some cloth, and other articles purchased at Hudson’s Bay, with which they were much dissatisfied, thinking they had been greatly imposed on in the barter.” To this Mr. Carver adds, “that allowing their accounts true, he could not help joining in their opinion; but afterwards he admits that this dissatisfaction might probably proceed, in a great measure, from the intrigues of the Canadian traders; and that the method they took to withdraw the Indians from their attachment to the Hudson’s Bay Company, and to engage their good opinion in behalf of their new employers, was by depreciating, on all occasions, the company’s goods, and magnifying the advantages that would arise to them from trafficking entirely with the Canadian traders: in this they too well succeeded; and from this, doubtless, did the dissatisfaction which the _Assinipoils_ and _Killistinoes_ proceed.” But, says he, further, “another reason augmented it, the length of the journey to the Hudson’s Bay Factories, which they informed him took up three months during the summer heats to go and return, and from the smallness of their canoes they could not carry more than one third of the beaver they {131} killed, so that it is not to be wondered at that the Indians should wish to have traders come to reside among them.” As Mr. Carver did not travel in the interior parts as a trader, he could not have any interested commercial motives; on that account he is certainly entitled to credit as an impartial observer: the public will judge of his remarks, and how far they tend to censure, or approve, the conduct of the Hudson’s Bay Company. I am induced to indulge this digression in consequence of a new publication on the present state of Hudson’s Bay by Mr. Umfreville.[85]