Presently both the brothers-in-law went off again to Hudson Bay, this time in French vessels, but in competition with a powerful and jealous French company; and on the return of the expedition to Quebec their furs were confiscated. They appealed to the French Government against this, but could not get justice. Radisson went back to England, made several more voyages to the Bay, and the last we know of him is that in his old age he had a pension of $250 a year from the Hudson’s Bay Company. He “died poor,” as we say, after making other men’s fortunes. Poor in money, yes; but the men who took the money he made are forgotten, and he will always be remembered as one of our greatest explorers. He had two ambitions, to discover new lands, and to make money by trade. He failed in one, but succeeded brilliantly in the other. A man with two such different aims can hardly ever succeed in both; and Radisson won the aim he most desired. His life was hard, but not poor—far richer than a soft life could have been. CHAPTER IV The Reign of King Beaver THE KING of the West was no longer the buffalo. From the time the Company opened its first fort on the Bay, the beaver was king; and his reign lasted two hundred years. White men and red alike, all were his servants. They served him for what they could get out of him, as courtiers often did with human kings in days not long ago. The buffalo remained the chief food and house-material used by the plainsmen themselves, but its skin was not so easy to sell as the beaver’s. To be sure, it had a cash value. Early in the eighteenth century we hear of a French company building many posts in the Mississippi Valley, to make fortunes by this “neglected” trade; and they collected 15,000 skins in one season. Many of us can remember the buffalo robe and coat in common use, down east, and their popularity was well deserved. Nevertheless, the Indians dealing with the fur traders found the beaver both lighter to carry and in greater demand. A wonderful monarch the beaver was—an architect, an engineer, an expert lumberman. So clever was he in damming up streams, felling trees and building lodges, that ignorant people came to believe anything of him. He was described as walking on his hind legs and carrying a log on his shoulder.