Meanwhile--out in Canada--Simon McTavish, “the Marquis,” was not idle up to the time of his death. The Hudson’s Bay had barred out other traders from Labrador. Good! Simon McTavish accepted the challenge, and from the government of Canada rented the old King’s Domain of Southern Labrador for £1000 a year. The English company had forbidden interlopers on the waters of Hudson Bay. Good! The Nor’Westers accepted that challenge. Duncan McGillivray, a nephew of McTavish, dictates a letter to the ancient English company begging them to sue him for what he is going to do, so that the case may be forever settled in the courts. Then he hires Captain Richards away from the Company and sends him on the ship _Eddystone_, in 1803, straight into Hudson Bay, to establish a trading post at Charlton Island and another at Moose for the Nor’Westers. The Hudson’s Bay Company declines the challenge. They will not sue the Northwest Company and so revive the whole question of their charter; but they sue their old Captain, John Richards, and order Mr. Geddes to hire more men in the Orkneys, and they freeze those interlopers out of the bay by bribing the Indians so that Simon McTavish’s men retire from Charlton and Moose with loss. And the English Adventurers go one farther: they petition Parliament, in 1805, for “authority to deal with crimes committed in the Indian country.” Simon McTavish dies in 1804. The X. Y.’s and the Nor’Westers unite, and well they do, for clashes are increasing between Hudson’s Bays and Nor’Westers, between English and French, from Lake Superior to the Rockies. Down at Nipigon in 1800, where Duncan Cameron had attracted the Indians away from Albany, first blood is shed. Young Labau, a Frenchman, whose goods have been advanced by the Nor’Westers, deserts for the Hudson’s Bay. Schultz, the Northwest clerk, pursues and orders the young Frenchman back. Labau offers to pay for the goods, but he will not go back to the Northwest Company. Schultz draws his dagger and stabs the boy to death. For this, he is dismissed by the Nor’Westers, but no other punishment follows for the murder. Albany River at this time was the trail inland from Hudson Bay to the plains, to the Red River and the Missouri and modern Edmonton. The Nor’Westers determined to block this trail. The Northwest partner, Haldane, came to Bad Lake in 1806 with five voyageurs and knocked up quarters for themselves near the Hudson’s Bay cabins. By May, William Corrigal, the Hudson’s Bay man, had four hundred and eighty packs of furs. One night, when all the English were asleep, the Nor’West bullies marched across, broke into the cabins, placed pistols at the head of Corrigal and his men, and plundered the place of furs. Never dreaming that Haldane, the Northwest partner, would countenance open robbery, Corrigal dressed and went across to the Northwest house to complain.