New Caledonia, as we know, is now a part of Canada; but why does not the Union Jack float over the great region beyond the Rockies {124} to the south--south of the Strait of Juan de Fuca and the 49th parallel? Over all this territory British fur lords once held sway. California was in the limp fingers of Mexico, but the British traders were operating there, and had ample opportunity to secure it by purchase long before it passed to the United States in 1848. Sir George Simpson, the resident governor of the Hudson's Bay Company, advised the company to purchase it, but the directors in London could not see furs in the suggestion. Simpson would have gone further, and reached out the company's long arm to the islands of the Pacific and negotiated with the natives for permission to build a fort in Hawaii. James Douglas was for buying all Alaska from the Russians; but to the directors of the Hudson's Bay Company Alaska seemed as remote and as worthless as Siberia, so they contented themselves with leasing a narrow strip along the shore. Thus California, Alaska, and Hawaii might easily have become British territory; but the opportunity was lost, and they went to the United States. So, too, did the fine territory of Oregon, out of which three states were afterwards added to the American Union. But the history of Oregon is confused in a maze of {125} politics, into which we cannot enter here. As we have seen, Bruno Heceta, acting for Spain, was the first mariner to sight the Columbia, and the American, Robert Gray, was the first to enter its mouth, thus proving Heceta's conjecture of a great river. Then for Great Britain came Vancouver and Broughton; then the Americans, Lewis and Clark and the Astorians; and finally Thompson, the British Nor'wester and the first man to explore the great river from its source to the sea. Then during the War of 1812 the American post on the Columbia passed to the North-West Company of Montreal; and if it had not been for the 'joint occupancy' agreement between Great Britain and the United States in 1818, Oregon would undoubtedly have remained British. But with the 'joint occupancy' arrangement leaving sovereignty in dispute, M'Loughlin of Oregon knew well that in the end sovereignty would be established, as always, by settlement.