t> .0^\^^.v<^ IMAGE EVALUATION TEST TARGET (MT-S) 7 ^ ^ ^/ % y. v; ^ Z ^ &< ^ .^ v: >' 7 ty/j Photographic Sciences Corpordlion 93 WIST MAIN STRIIT WIBSTIR.N.Y MSIO (716) •73-4S03 ^N^ ^ .X C,' P.\ ' ^ ;\ ^ v> ^' *» iV '^>^ Xp Mp CIHM/ICMH Microfiche Series. CIHM/ICIVIH Collection de microfiches. Canadian Institute for Historical Microreproductions / Institut Canadian de microreproductions hibtoriques \ \ Technical and Bibliographic Notes/Notes techniques et bibliographiques The Institute has 'jttempted to obtain the best original copy available for filming. Features of this copy which may be bibliographically unique, which may alter any of the images in the reproduction, or which may significantly change the usual method of filming, are checked below. n D □ □ n D Coloured covers/ Couverture de couleur I I Covers damaged/ Couverture endommagie Covers restored and/or laminated/ Couverture restaurie et/ou pelliculAe I I Cover title missing/ Le titre de couverture manque □ Coloured maps/ Cartes giographiques en couleur Coloured ink (i.e. other than blue or black)/ Encre de couleur (i.e. autre que bleue ou noire) I I Coloured plates and/or illustrations/ Planches et/ou illustrations en couleur Bound with other material/ Relii avec d'autres documents Tight binding may cause shadows or distortion along interior margin/ La re liure serrie peut causer de I'ombre ou de la distortion le long de la marge int4riaur(i Blank leaves added during restoration may appear within the text. Whenever possible, these have been omitted from filming/ II se peut que certaines pages blanches ajouties lors d'une restauration apparaissent dans la texte, mais, lorsque cela Atait possible, ces pages n'ont pas iti filmies. Additional comments:/ Commentaires supplAmentaires; L'Institut a microfilm^ le meilleur exemplaire qu'il lui a iti possible de se procurer. Les details de cet exemplaire qui sont peut-dtre uniques du point de vue bibiiographique, qui peuvent modifier une image reprodiiite, ou qui peuvent exiger una modification dan^ la mithode normale de filmage sont indiqu^s ci-dessous. □ Coloured pages/ Pages de couleur I — I Pages damaged/ v/ D Pages endommagies Pages restored and/or laminated/ Pages restauries et/ou pelliculies Pages discoloured, stained or foxed/ Pages d Ate i^^^ ^ I 1 I I I II |- I J_^ . , » * oL i^^ i. Trim i t GEORGE BRYCE L "*"*'™™' ■""*"*»* «^S«S' -"""-Tot r***!^ I r's A WPER REAP fiePOne THE SOCIETY. CW THE EVE^f;;; ^- , . . OF 2er» NOVEMBER 1885, ^ ^KsaoJs lis ojEnsroiss. ^1 m ¥-»■ '^1 ** * r ,» /I ?: ^1 The Old Settlers of Red River, ♦ ♦ ♦ Tlieir Arrival and Settlement, and «itlier IVIatters of Interest oonneeted with the Openhiff-np of the Canadian Northwest. I'aper Read hy Prof. Hi-yce, Li.L.l)., hefore the Manitoba HiHtori<;al Society, The following paper on "The Old Set- tlers of Red River" was read by Rev. Prof. Bryce before the Historical Society on Thursday evening: — On the bank) of the Red River of the North for well nigh sixty years there existed the Selkirk Settlement. Fort Garry, so well known, was its centre for nearly fifty years of that period. The fur trader on the Mackenzie River looked to it as his probable haven of rest when he should have finished his days of active service and have retired ; the half-breed hunter of the plains thought of it as the paradise to which he mii/ht make his annual visit, or the place where he might at last sei^tle, while the Kildonan settler boasted that there was no place like his ^oasis' in the Northwest wilderness, and that the traveller who had tasted the magical waters of Red River would al- ways return to them a^ain. The Cana- dian youth read in his school-book of a far distant outpost. Fort Garry, and chilled by the very sound of the name, whispering "cold as Siberia," passed on to the next subject. The Canadian statesman dreamt of a Canada from ocean to ocean, but as he thought of the thous- and miles (jf impassable rocks and mo- rasses between him and the fur traders he could only shudder and say 'Perhaps sometime!' while the secretary wf the Hudson's Bay Company House in Mon- treal or London with darkest secrecy folded together his epistles, addressed them ''via Pembina," and then slipt quietly away to his suburban residence, knowing that ho had the key in his pock- et to unlock the door to half a continent, around which was built an impenetrable Chinese wall. EARLY KKCOHMS. Prof. Keating, one of Major Long's exploritit^ party which passed through Red River Settlement in 182.'i, gives us Botvie account of it. Alexander Ross, the old sheritt'of Assiniboia, wrote in 1852 a minute and excellent, though some tell us a somewhat partial history of the set- tlement, where he dwelt so long. In 1858 appeared the werk of E. D. Neill, the historian of Minnesota, in which is a good account of the Red River people — those Gibeonitea of the interior— as they appeared on their freighting journeys ♦■o St. Paul. Mr. Neill seems disposed largely to adopt Ross's standpoint. In the same year Miss Tucker (A. L. O. E.) gave an interesting and useful account of the planting of the Church of England missions in Red River, in her little 'vol- ume "The Rainbow of the North." Those intrepid travellers, Lord Milten and Dr. Cheadle, published in 1865 a most graphic and timely sketch of their "Northwest passage by land," not omit- ting the Red River Settlement. Subse- quent writers have not failed to avail themselves of the collected materials of these distinguiched visitors. So, too, should be mentioned "Red River" by Mr. J. J. Hargrave (1871) from the Hud- son's Bay Company standpoint. My work this evening is somewhat dif- ferent from that aimed at by these auth- ors. I desire to give a more complete ao- count of the settlers, and to some extent their personal history, which those writ- ers were not in some cases able to do, and in other cases were not disposed to do. While referring you for the fullest account extant of Lord Selkirk's life to Manitoba; "its infancy, growth, and pres- ent condition", a few words must be said of THE FOUNDER of the Red River settlement. It was as early as 1802 that thn R^rl of Selkirk, a man of philanthropi- 'ad liberal views, stirred by the ace uiits given by Sir Alexander Mackenzie, (1801), and other traders to the Indian Country, wrote t« the British (iovernment of the day, in a letter, of which we have in the Historical Society, a copy obtained from the British Archives for the purpose of relieving Irish distress and Highland misery, a col- ony on Red River. It was not till 1811 that Lord Selkirk succeeded in obtaining, by purchase from the Hudson's Bay Com- pany, of which in the meantime he had become a member, the district of Assini- boia on Red River, comprising ll(i,000 square miles. By way of Hudson Bay was the route chosen ; and in the letters of the founder occur the words — words of still unfulfilled, but no doubt true pro- phecy : "To a colony in these territories the channel of trade must be the river of Port Nelson." THE HIGHLANDERS. At this time(1811) there were sad times in the Highlands of Scotland. Cottars and crofters were being driven from their small holdings by the Ducheas of Suther- land and others, to make way for large sheep farms. Strong men stood sullenly by, women wept and wrung their hands, and children clung to their distressed parents as they saw their cab- ins burnt before their eyes. The "High- land clearances" have left a stain on the escutcheons of more than one nobleman. Lord Selkirk, whose estates were in the south of Scotland, and who had no special connection with the Celts, nevertheless took pity on the helpj-as Highland ex- iles. Ships were pr'- ^., and the fol- lowing are the numi of highland colo- nists sent out in the respective years: In 1811, reaching Red River in 1812. there were 70 In 1812, reaching Red River in 1813, there were (a part Highland) lour 20 In 1813, reaching Red River In 1814, there were 5)3 In 1815, reaching Red River the sa i.e year, there were 100 Total Selkirk Highlandcolonista. about.. 270 The names of these settlers were those well known amongst us, as Sutherland, McKay, McLeod, McPherson, Mathescm, Macdonald, Livingstone, Poison, Mc- Beath, Bannerman and Gunn. There are other names found among those early comers which have disappeared, and to which we shall afterwards refer. It will be noticed that at the end of 1814 the colony amounted to 180 or 200 per- sons. These were under Governor Miles Macdonell, late a captain of the Queen's Rangers, who was also Hudson's Bay Company Governor. The connection of the Selkirk colonists with the Hudson's Bay Company was regarded as a menace Hy the RIVAL FUR TRADERS. the Northwest Company. The two onin- panies had their rival posts side by side at many points throughout the Territor- ies The Nor' wester fort standing imme- diately at the junction of the lied and Assiniboine rivers was called Fort Gibraltar. T' a fort occupied by the colony was at the foot of Common street in this city, and was called Fort Douglas. It is of no consequence ^o our present object to determine who opened hostili ties or who was to blame in the contest of the companies. Strife prevailed, and through this the colonists suffered. In 1814 arrived on the scene a jauntily dressed officer of the Nor'west Company brandishing a sword and signing himself captain — one Duncan Cameron. This man was a clever, diplomatic, and rather unscrupulous instrument of his company, and coming to command Fort Gibraltar, cultivated the colonists, spoke Gaelic to and entertained them with much hospi- tality, and ended by inducing about one hundred and fifty of the two hundred of them to desert Red River ana go' with him to Upper Canada. Among those who went were not only persons bearing the names already mentioned, but others named McKinnon, Cooper, Smith, Mc- Lean, McEachern and Campbell, who have left no representatives on Red River. By a lonj; and -wearisome journey to Fort William, and then in small boats along Lakes Superior and Huron, they reached Penetanguishene and found new homes near Toronto, London and elsewhere. To the faithful half hundred who remained true to their pledges all honor is due. Of those early colonists one name especially occurs to me— that of Donald Gunn, a native of Caithnes- shire. He came out with the party of 1813 in the service of the Hudson's Bay Company, and after spending several years on the bay married and settled down in the parish of St. Andrew's. He was a scho<>l master for a time, was a great reader, took much interest in the collections for the Smithsonian Institu- tion — a society te which this society is largely indebted — was a collector of sta- tistics and meteorological data. During last summer a professor in Boston who was on the astronomical expedition to the Saskatchewan between IHoO and 70, asked me with much interest of "old Donald Gunn,*' so familiar a fiyure in former days in Little Britain. His large family still remain among ub. THE IRISH. To many it is known that the Lord Selkirk colonists were chiefly Highland- ers; few are acquainted with the fact that there was among them a fair sprinkl- ing of Irish peoplo. In t'"M first ship load lar^e to York factory, that of 1811, besides the 70 Highlanders, there were some 20 Irish colonists and employes. In the next com- pany, that of 1812, most of those sent out were skilled workmen to erect buildings and help the settlers— of the 15 or 20 so sent a considerable part were Irish. In the first ship of 1811 was an Irish lad, who never deserted his adopted country and lived and died in our midst. This was Andrew McDermott. He married in the country and lived on the banks of Red River for 69 years. He was a successful trader, and accumulated a large aiuuuut of wealth. His large family, in many branches, live amongst us at this day. Many a new settler got a helping hand from him, and he was a perfect mine of information about the country — its climate, its set- tlers, and its resources. His stout, well- known figure still lingers in the minds of many of us. In the party of 1812-13 there came to the country also a young Irish clerk, John P. Bourke. He was an intelligent and useful officer of the col- ony. He married a native who had Scotch and Dakota blood, and his de- scendants are well known as the Bourke family; one of them was a few years ago member in the Legislative Assembly for St. James. Belonging to this Irish immi- gration were the following, most of whom left Red River under the guidance of Mr. Duncan Cameron, viz. : Patrick Cor- coran, Patrick McNolty and wife, Mi- chael Heden, a blacksmith, who, in troublous times, assumed command of the artillery in the colonists' hands as gunner, James Toomey, Hugh Swords, Martin Jordan, Michael Kilkenny, Mi- chael Kilbride, one Kerrigan, Joseph Kenny, and Capt. Macdonnell's body servant, James Fiynn. All these repre- sented the Green Isle and seemed to have taken their full share in the lively antagonisms of the rival companies. THE DE iMKURONS. The arrival of the third party of High- landers in 1815 reinforced the remnant who had resisted Cameron's seductive proposals. The colony a'^ain rose to three-fourths its original strength. In 1816 the Nor' Westers adopted more ex- treme measures still to destroy the col- ony. An atcack was made upon the set- tlers on lUth J une, and the new Gov- ernor, Robert Seinple, was killed, with a number of his attendants, at a spot a little oti' Main street north, be- yond the city limits. Lord Selkirk on the receipt of the news of the colony in 1815 had come to Montreal, and was pro- ceeding up the lakes to assist his colony in 1816 when the news reached him on the way of the skirmish of "Seven Oaks" and the death of the Governor. He was at the very time bringing with him as settlers, a number of disbanded soldiers,, who have usually been known as the "De Meurons." The regiments to which these men belonged were part of the body of German Mercenaries whicn had been raised during the Napoleonic wars. The name of Col. De Meuron, one of the prin- cipal officers was given to the whole. These new settlers were not only Ger- mans, but had among them a number of Swiss and Piedmontese. In 1813 the De Meurons had been lying at Malta, and sailed thence to Canada to take part in the war against the United States. The war of 1812 ] 5 having been ended, in May 1816 orders came for the reduction of the force, and on 4th June 1816 Lord Selkirk engaged four officers and eighty men of the De Meuron regiment in Mont- real and hastened in boats up the St. Lawrence. At Kingston twenty more men, these of the regiment De Watteville, a body in similar circumstances with the De Meurons was engaged. The four of- ficers were Captains D'Orsonnens and Matthey, and Lieutenants Fauche and Gratfenreith. The men were promised certain wa ms, as well as land grants at Red River. In the autumn of 1816 the party arrived at Fort William, which they seized, and the camping place on Thunder Bay is still called Point De Meuron. Em- ployed during the winter in opening out for a distance a military road, the party under command of Capt. D'Orsonnens, in early spring pushed on by way of the north-west angle of the Lake of the Woods, surprised the Nor'westers, and retook Fort Douglas from them. Lord Selkirk arrived at the Red River in the last week of June, 1817. In accord- ance with his agreement he settled all the De Meurons who wished to remain — a considerable number — along the banks of the little river, the Seine, which empties into Red River opposite Point Douglas. This stream has among the old settlers always been known as German Creek in consenB, but where is the judge who escapes that ? The old gentleman still lives, upwards of 80 years of age, in London, and has seen strange things among the Metis since his departure in 1854. Among the leaders in this affair — and I am not now pro- nouncing on the merits of the Sayer case — was one of the ominous name of Riel, the miller of the Seine, the father of the late unfortunate prisoner. The older Riel was an agitator of the tirst water. Going on with the Metis it needs not that I should recite to you the doings in the rebellion of 1869-70, it was simply the out-break of the " Seven-oaks " and "Sa- yer " affair again. — A too generous Gov ernment overlooked the serious nature of those events. It was reserved for what we trust may be the last mani- festation of this uniuly spirit exis- tent for three ({uarters of a century to show itself on the banks of the Sas- katchewan in 1885. Louis Riel was un- doubtedly the embodiment of the spirit of unrest and insubordination in his race. Tribes and peoples do at times find their personification in one of their number. Ambitious, vain, capable of inspiring con- fidence, in the breasts of the ignorant, yet violent, vacillating, and vindictive \ the rebel cnieftain has died for the turbu- lence of the Buis-brules, ever their feature for thp last seventy years BNOLfSH HALF BBBEDS. As different as is the patient roadster from the wild mustang in the English- speaking half-breed from the Metis. I have lived many years acquainted with this people and have found them intelli- gent, and in many things much beyond their opportunities. So early as 1775 the traveller, Alexander Henry, found Orkney employes in the service oi the Hudson's Bay Company at Cumberland House. The Orkney Islands furnished so many useful men to the company that in 1810, when ttiH BoiS'brules came to attack the colony, though the colonists were mostly Highlanders they were called "Les Or- canais " Since 1821 the same supply of employes to the company has continued and increased with occasionally an ad- mixture of Caithnessshiremen and other Highlanders. Accordingly the English- speaking half-breedt are really of Scotch descent, almost entirely. From Hudson Bay to distant Yukon, the steady going Orkney men have come with their Indian wives and half-breed children and made the Red River their home. I have but to mention such well-known and respectable names as Inkster, Fobis, Setter, Harper, Mowat, Omand, Flelt, Linklater, Tait, Spence, Monkman and others to show how valuable an element of our population the English half-breeds have been, though, of course, we have those bearing these names as well who are of pure Orkney blood. I select two specially outstantiUng names. Alexander Kennedy Isbister was born in the year 1822 at Cumberland House, the son of a Hudson's Bay Company officer whose family afterwards came to Red River. In 1842 he left his native land for England, and there, his education completed, be- came a barrister and leading education- ist. His love for his native country was such that he fought the battle for the opening up of the Red River settlement. His name will ever Ije remembered on Red River. His generous gift of 1^83,000 to Manitoba University, with his library, will preserve his name from generation to generation. One other name I men- tion here. It is that of the Hon. John Norquay, who li is, with the competition of so many energetic and competent new- comers held for ye its the place of Pre- mier of Manitoba HI'DSON's B.\Y ('OMI'.^NY ofpicrk.s. No element, however, did so much for Red River of old as the intellisiont and high-spirited ofticerB of the Hudson's Bay Company, f)f whom many settled in the country. There was among them also a strong Highland and Orkney strain. In few countries is the speech of the people generally so correct as it was in the Red River settlement. This undoubtedly arose from the influence of the ■ educated Hudson's Bay Company officers. At their -istant posts on the long nights they re..d useful books and kept their journals. Numbers of them collected specimens of natural history, Indian curiosities, took meteorological observations and the like. Though all may not have been the pink of perfec- tion, yet very few bodies of men retained as a whole so upright a character as these. I have but to mention such names asPru- den, Bird, Bunn, Stewart, Lillie, Campbell, Christie, Kr. nedy, Heron, Ross, Mur- ray, Mackenzie, Hardisty, Graham, Mc- Tavish, Bannatyne, Cowan, Rowand, Sinclair, Sutherland, Finlayson, Smith, Balsillie, and Hargrave and others, who have settled on the Red River to com- mand, 1 know, your assent to my asser- tion. THE PENSIONERS. Most portions of the New World have grown from additions trom the military, who have for some reason or other come to them. So it was in Red River settle- ment. In 184() the Cth regiment of foot, some three hundred and fifty strong, was sent out by way of Hudson's Bay under Col Crofton in connection with the Oregon question, then disturbing the relations of Great Britain and the United States. Few of the regiment remained in the country. The troublous state of aftdira in Recorder Thorn's time induced the company to send but a number of pensioners and settlers who should be settled near the fort, and be useful in time of emergency as police. It was in 1848 that Col. Caldwell, with fifty six non-commissioned officers, and men of whom forty-two were married and had families, came out by way of Hudson's Bay, each man being promised twenty acres of land, and each sergeant forty. Such namesas Mulligan, Rickards and oth- ers well-known, beUmg to this period. It was after their arrival that the Sayor emeute took place. THE CENSUS. The nucleus of 160 Kildonan settlers in 181G had with it a few Metis already settled down, but there was a need for a settlement for the midst of the vast fur territories. The Nor' West Company ever opposed to settlement, we learn from 8 Harmon's book, had a scheme on foot at this time to establish a native settlement on Rainy River and had the money sub- scribed for an educational institution there. A settlement once established on Rad River many Socked to it. Thus it was that in ten years after the death of Governor Semple there were of Hi^^hlanders, DeMeurons, Swiss, French voyageurs, Metis and Orkney half-breeds not less than fifteen hundred settlers. It was certainly a motley throng. The Rev. Mr. West, the first missionary, tells us that he distributed copies of the Bible in English, Gaelio. German, Danish, Italian, atid French, and they were all gratefully received in this polyglot community. Though the colony lost by ('esertions as we have seen, yet it continued to gain by the addition of retiring Hudson's Bay Company officers and servants, who took up land as allowed by the company in strips along the river after the Lower Crf>naclian fashion for which they paid small sums. There were in many cases no deeds, simply the registration of the name in the company's register. A man sold his lot for a horse and it was a mat- ter of chance whether the registration of the change in the lot took place or not. This was certainly a mode of transferring land free ennuuh to suit an English radical or evoii hloniy iJeorge The land reached as far out from the river as could be seen by looking under a horse, say two miles, and back of this was the limit- less prairie which became a species »t common where all could cut hay, and where herds could run uncontined. Wood, water and hay were the three ;*'s of a Red River settler's life ; to cut poplar rails for hi? fyncos in spring and burn the dried r»Tjf< :> the following winter was (|uite thij /i.M ; , ized thing. There was no iiidi.w ' :• jnt. to grow surplus grain, as each KC'ttler could only get a market for ei'^.i! ' I, ''In of wheat from the Hudsun's Ba J iiipany. It could not be e.\ ported. i-'tmJcan from the plains was easy to get; the habits of the people were simple; tlieir wants were few, and while the pic- ture was hardly Aroadiiin, yet ♦^lie new order of thini/s has borne pretty severely upon many, b<> that they feel as did the kindly old lady, the occupant of colony gardens till two years ago, that hey were "shut in" by so many people coming to the country. The census of the whole Buttlement gave in 184!>, 5,2!>I, and in IH^i), (i,r)2.'i. The population by natural increase tnul by additions from the Terri- tories, United States and Canada had in 1871, when the Dominion census was taken, reached to about 2,000 whites, 5,000 English half breeds, and 5,000 Metis. THE PARISH EH. No municipal government was ever provided for the people of Red River, though extensive petitions were for warded to Britain for changes to be made in the government of the country. The Assiniboia Council, however, passed cer- tain ordinances, appointed road overseers, and from a slight tariff of 4 per cent, on imports enough was raised to carry on public affairs. The local subdivisions of Assiniboia were largely national and re- ligious: French and Roman Catholics taking up a certain portion of river bank, Church of England half-breeds another, Scottish settlers and Presbyterians an- other. This was done sometimes by the will of the H. B. Company and some- tunes witho"t it. The first parish was Kildonan, so set apart and named by Lord Selkirk on his visit in 1817; the De Meuron and Swiss settlement (1817-23) on the Seine, was the next resulting in the parish of St. Boniface. The neighborhood of Fort Daer, where Pembina now stands, was always a famous resort for the Red River settlers, on ac- count of the open plains supplying buf- falo. The agents of Lord Selkirk endeav ored to induce a number of the French half-breeds and settlers to leave Pembina and settlenoar Ft. Garry. In this they large ly succeeded, although a number of half- breeds remained there. At St. Jose, a village in the deep cut of the Pembina River through the Pembina Mountains, 50 miles west of Red llivor, was a Metis village in 1802 numbering several liiin- dred souls. On this partial conscdidation of the Red River settlements the most roving of the Boisbrules settled under Mio leadership of Cuthbert (iraiit on the As- siniboine, which many of the Metis have always called the St. Charles, it having been h(» named by Vorandrye. This set- tlement was twenty miles from Red River, at White Horse Plains, in what is now St. Francois Xavier Parish. The first Protestant church in the c(tuntry was at St. .lohn's, which was originnlly intended largely for the Kildonan set- tlers. On its ceasing to be their church the present KilJonan church was built at what was known nn the ( Jrnnouillierc, or Frog Plain, in 1804 St. .lohn's was after- wards known as tlin upper church In 1H24 the church on Image IMaiii beciiuie tlio nuulouH of what is now known as St. Paul's Parish. In 18:{1 Ubv. William Cochrane < ids, thus b This churc Church," I Parish ch Church." missionarj at what is work amo same inde oppositior tablished boine sett thenucleu it gather These are ments ; fi overflows were forii fer to Cat tendpd \ Fort (iari miles : uj or thirty, about SIX settlemei Agathe, thirty mi Winnipe) Laurent. there woi twelve E N 1 have closely ii gress of might be Red Riv Alexand (loverno 1835 bui ernor Fi govornoi Caldwell ernor B both As delicate times of an ohjec his hani departe( (!ompar speak o much f( the prit nsus was )0 whites, nd 5,000 was ever ed River, irere for be made y. The issed cer- overseers, r cent, on carry on visions of and re- Catholics iv bank, another, nans an- les by the id soine- )iiriah was named by "; the De (1817-23) suiting in vo: er, where a famous rs, on ac- ilying buf- •k endeav B French > Pembina they large er of half- t. Jose, a Pembina [ountains, iis a Metis 3ral hitn- an the As- f etirt have it having This set- rum Red n what is ish. The country itrigiMally >nan set- ir cliurch was built inuillierc, was after- roh In 1 bi'c'niuo VII as St. William Cochrane erected the church at the Rap- ids, thus beginning St. Andrew's Parish. This church was known as the "Lower Church," after which time St. Paul's Parish church was called the ''Middle Church." It was in 1836 that this zealous missionary built a church for the Indians at what is now St, Peter's, and did agDod work among the poor Aborigines. This same indefatigable worker, in the face of opposition from the H. B. Company, es- tablished in 1867, outside of the Assiiii- boine settlement, the church which was thenucleusof Portage la Prairie,and round it gathered Indins and half breeds. These are the nuclei of the old settle- ments ; from them, as room was needed, overflows took place and new parishes were formed till at the time of the trans- fer to Canada in 1871, the settlement ex- tendpd without serious interupticm fnmi Fort Garry down Red River for say forty miles : up Red River for perhaps twenty or thirty, and wp the Assinibrjine for abi)ut sixty miles ; there were outlying settlements of Metis of importance at St. Agathe, Pembina, Poiiite de Chenes — thirty miles up the Seine to the east of Winnipeg, and on Lake Manitoba at St. Laurent. At the time of the transfer there were reckoned twelve French and twelve English parishes. NOTABLES OF RED RIVKR 1 have already noted some of those closely identified with the life and pro- gress of Red River Settlement. Sketches might bo written of the Go/ernors of Red River Settlement or Assiiiiboia : of Alexander McDonell the ''grasshopper" (Jovernor: of Governor Christie, who in 1835 built the new Fort Garry : of (Jov- ernor Fiiilayson in 1844 the "peojales' governor": of the military (Jovernor CJaidwell and his pensioners : and of (Jov- ernor McTavish who was goviTiior of both Assiniboia and Ruper^ii Land, whose delicate health amidst the troublous times of Riel's first rebellion made him an object of sympathy as he let fall from his hand the wand of ofiioe, with which departed the rule of the Hudson's Ray Company as a governing body. Or I might speak of early missionaries who have done much for the Red River Sottlemont, To the priest of 18IH who became the be- loved and amiable Bishop Provencher, (1844 1853) or to his worthy successor in office, June 1853 till now. Arch- bishop Tache, to Archdeacon Coch- rane, who has been justly styled the founder of the Church of Eng- land in Rupert's Land; to the Venerable Archdeacon Cowley ; or to Bishop An- derson, 1849- 18G4 ; or to Bishop Mach- ray from 18G5 to the present, all of whom have been self denying and useful men ; or to that man of apostolic zeal, Rev. John Black, 1851 1882, the founder of Presbyterianism on Red River. I might mention settlers such as Logan, Fonseca, Barber, Schultz, and others, who arrived at various times at Red River and whose names are found marking the streets of our city, but time forbids me to say more. CONCLUSION. The old Red River life has gone never to return; a new Kildonan has spread it- self out inti) Springfield, Sunnyside, Mill- brook, Grassmore, Brant, Argylo, and elsewhere; a Boisbrule overflow has taken place to St. Albert, Batoche, QuAppelle, and to many a lonely lake and river in our North west ',)lain8 ; the English half- breed has hurried west to Edmonton, Prince Albert, and Battleford, to find a home like that on his old Red River It will never be (|uite appreciated by those from abroad f)f later years what the Red Riv«r settlement did for us who succeed it. It marked the slow but sure process of an influence of christianizifion and semi civilization of many of our Indians ; it gave the introduction from j, barbarous and wandering life to habits of order and settled work ; it furnished a valuable pio- neering and trading ageney for the fur trade, for surveying our plains, and for our Canadian exploration ; it gave us the nucluus of our present educational and relinioua organizatiuns ; it made the H. B Co not only a trading company, but a comi)aiiy helping forward in different linos the improvement of the Indians, and made them the friends of education and religion, ami if I read the story of its history aright it saved to Britain and Canada, the vast Northwest which would otlyarwiso hot unlikely have met the fate of Oregon. Ljjjfv '^H cnM •••»*•••'